This Feature is part of my ongoing True Campaign Managery course. If you ain’t been following from the start or don’t even know what that means, use The True Campaign Managery Course Index to fix that.

This particular lesson is part of a module called True Mechanical Managery. It’s all about how campaign managing Game Masters set policies and make plans to deal with tricky game issues before they come up.

When Death Comes Calling

Welcome back, gamers and gamettes. I’m still doing the True Campaign Managery thing and, specifically, the True Mechanical Managery module sub-thing. Today’s topic: why is Character Death a total frigging disaster that you absolutely must be prepared to mitigate. I’ll cover what that mitigation preparation actually looks like next time.

Yep, I’m doing the same crap I did with Experience and Advancement here. I’m breaking this lesson in two. In the first part, I’ll tell you why Character Death is complicated and why you therefore need a plan for it even if you think it’ll never happen. In the second part, I’ll tell you how to make that plan.

As with Experience and Advancement, I ain’t going to launch into a whole long thing about whether Character Death is good or bad or how best to handle it or remove it or which mechanical systems do death best. This is purely about how you, the Campaign Manager, come up with a plan that’s best for your particular game with regard to Character Death.

And that might confuse some of my loyal supporters…

A Special Note for Angry Discordians

If you support my work with more than readership and snarky comments — for which, by the way, everyone should be grateful because without supporters like you, no one would be reading this crap — if you support this site financially and therefore get to hang out in the Angry Discord Server — the gaming equivalent of the cool kid’s table — you might have noticed a little two-day-long intense debate about the role that Character Death plays in tabletop roleplaying games and whether it’s time to seriously rethink whether it’s even got a place in gaming anymore. I know I said some shocking, upsetting things that sounded like shit my goateed mirror universe double might say. Lots of you got mad at me. Some of you got mad at each other. Some of you literally stormed out forever. A good time was had by all.

If you witnessed any of that crap, you might be confused at how I’m just carrying on today like none of it ever happened. I’m just going on as if Character Death is a thing that mostly happens how the book — whatever book — says it happens and telling you how to handle it when it does. Why? Because in this classroom, I teach people how to run the games they’ve got. Campaign Managers don’t redesign systems and it’s totally okay to just go with the system you’ve got even if you’re wondering if it doesn’t have some serious design flaws. That shit just doesn’t matter as much as it seems.

In short, I’m compartmentalizing. It’s a thing I do. I’m asking you to do the same. If you want to continue the giant-ass fight — with me or without me — about whether Character Death should even actually be a thing in tabletop gaming anymore, please do it in the Discord server or in private side chats. Or just wait for the inevitable article in which I tell everyone that actually Character Death is a crap idea and it’s time to dump it from the vast majority of tabletop roleplaying games. That’ll be a spicy comment section.

Thank you. Moving on.

Destroying Characters

As with that Experience and Advancement shit, I’ve got to spell out precisely what I mean by Character Death so that we’re all on the same page. Fortunately, Character Death ain’t quite as ambiguous as Experience and Advancement System. Pretty much all y’all know what it means for a character to die. But, I do want to be very clear and I am actually going to net me a wider umbrella here than you’re probably thinking.

When I say, Character Death, I’m referring to any game mechanic that results in the involuntary destruction of a player character. Anything that permanently removes a character from play and thus, by itself, leaves the character’s player unable to participate in the game counts here. Obviously, that includes a character running out of hit points and bleeding out or failing too many Death Saves or whatever, but it also includes things like petrification and soul destruction and the severing of the Astral Cord and all sorts of other fantastical things that bring a character’s story to an end. Even maiming counts if it’s to the point where it’s impossible for the character to continue adventuring.

Further, Character Death, as a concept, also includes anything that results in the Game Master taking over the character. If the character is turned into an abomination or raised as an undead or, in one of my campaigns, the character crosses a moral event horizon into truly evil territory, the character is effectively destroyed and replaced with a non-player character while the player is eliminated from play.

The involuntary component here is important, but it bears clarifying. If a character is slaving under permanent negative conditions — again, considering maiming — and the player decides the conditions are too much and retires the character, that’s not really Character Death. The player must not have the option of continuing. However, note that a player choosing a character action that is guaranteed to end the character’s life — noble sacrifice or some shit like that — that is Character Death. But it’s also a gray area.

Another gray area, thanks to the wonder of fantasy gaming, is the concept of permanence. There are means in many games to reverse the otherwise permanent destruction of a character. Characters can be raised from the dead, stone can be turned back to flesh, healing magic can undo almost any crippling injury, and so on. Just because something’s reversible doesn’t mean it’s not permanent. Yes, I know what I said; shut up.

Speaking of reversible gray areas, there’s also the issue of the player being eliminated from the game. We all know that’s actually a temporary state. In the short term, the player can take control of an NPC or hireling or something and in the long term, that player’s going to make a new character. It’s not like being eliminated from play means kicking the player out of the campaign.

It’s important, however, to distinguish Character Death from temporary conditions that prevent the player from acting through their character. Sleep spells and paralysis and unconsciousness and imprisonment certainly do remove the character and player from the game, but there’s no question that the player and the character are coming back in fairly short order. And, really, it’s that assumption that separates temporary debility from Character Death.

When a character dies — by any of the means I described above or any other — the character and the player go into this Limbo of uncertainty. Maybe the condition is reversible, maybe it’s not, but there’s no way to be sure until the game plays out and, likewise, while the player’s participation in the game is assured, there’s still a big question about who they’ll be playing and how they will enter or re-enter the game.

Honestly, this whole discussion about what Character Death actually means is only necessary because so many of you drive me absolutely fucking crazy with your demands for hard-and-fast bright lines and your nitpicky pedantry and your inability to trust in judgment calls. I just know some dumbass is already chambering a comment or e-mail or Discord message about how to classify a character being imprisoned while the rest of the party mounts a two-session rescue mission that may or may not work.

“Where’s that fit on the spectrum, Angry? Is that technically Character Death?”

Just know you’re the reason I hate this job.

Speaking, by the way, of your personality defects…

Let’s Talk About Your Sucky Attitude

Now, I know how that heading sounds but the forthcoming ain’t just a ranty digression so I can dump on you. It’s actually totally relevant. Dumping on you is just gravy.

One of the biggest, baddest problems that Character Death causes in games — one Game Masters totally must be ready for — is also one most Game Masters don’t know how to cope with because they have uniformly piss-poor attitudes and terrible mindsets. That’s down to three things. The first is one I’ve talked about before. The other two are diametrically opposing viewpoints and almost every Game Master is staunchly entrenched in either one or the other. One’s kinda Oldschool and the other is kinda Modern. Both are shit attitudes you can’t have if you mean to manage a campaign like a True Campaign Manager.

The Usual Disclaimer

Here at Angry Games, Inc., we only write about — and only care about and only have opinions about — pretend elf games. The forthcoming discussion about terrible Game Mastering attitudes might seem broadly applicable to life in general. You might think that I’m trying to teach you an important lesson about life and dealing with others. I’m not. You’re wrong. I don’t give a shit how you live your life or how you get along with others. Hell, I don’t actually care whether you run good games or not. I’m paid to write lessons; I ain’t paid to actually change your mind.

The point is, nothing below pertains to anything other than how you handle yourself in pretend elf games.

Stop Saying Punishment

The first piss-poor attitude you need to excise from your dumb skull is thinking in terms of punishment. I already did a long-ass rant on that, though, so this is just a reminder. Character Death is not a punishment for playing wrong. It’s not something players deserve because of their screwups or stupid choices. It’s not even something that’s there to incentivize good decisions and good play.

And it never ever should be.

Death is just an outcome. Unless it’s literally a one-shot kill — and it isn’t — death ain’t the result of a bad choice or unlucky die roll. It’s the end of a long series of choices, outcomes, and circumstances beyond any players’ control. It’s easy to find a proximate cause for a character’s death — “but for that one thing, the character would be alive” — but that ain’t reality. Death is just a thing that happens when people undertake life-or-death struggles. And I don’t just mean combat. Adventuring is a life-or-death profession.

If you think of Character Death in terms of punishment in any way for any reason, you’re wrong and you’re a shitty Game Master. Death is an outcome, pure and simple.

By the way, the belief that Character Death should never be the result of random die rolls but instead only happen because the players’ decisions warranted it is just a really subtle restatement of, “Death is a punishment for poor choices.” Think about it.

Feelings are Real… and Normal

When characters die, players get sad. It’s normal for the player whose character kicked it to feel grief, loss, frustration, guilt, anger, or despair. Hell, it’s normal for the other players to feel grief, loss, frustration, guilt, or anger. Those are normal responses to Character Death. They’re healthy. They mean the players care, emotionally, about the game. You can’t be invested in something and not feel a profound sense of loss when it’s taken from you.

I say this because lots of you Game Masters — especially you self-proclaimed Oldschoolers — dismiss the pain, grief, and frustration over losing characters as something players just need to suck up and move on from. “It’s just part of the game. It’s just pretend elves. Don’t get worked up. Make a new character and move on.” That attitude is callous and cruel and frankly inhuman. I’ve lost characters — even back in my Oldschool days before I discovered gaming was more fun if you weren’t an asshole — and it upset me. Hell, Character Death still upsets me, today, as a Game Master. It’s emotional. If you dismiss it as silly or overly sensitive, you’re a dick. Full frigging stop.

Are there extremes? Of course. Some players have intense emotional reactions that go beyond normal and healthy. I ain’t saying everything every player does in response to losing a character is justified. I ain’t saying every tantrum is healthy. I’m just saying that True Campaign Managers know that Character Death is emotionally upsetting and that different players will process it differently and, thus, True Campaign Managers must be prepared to deal with or diffuse it so the game can continue in a healthy way just as life continues after a loss.

Except I am not talking about life. Just games.

Feelings Aren’t Reality… They Aren’t Everything

When characters die, players get sad. It’s normal. But, let’s be real here: this shit’s all just pretend elf games for fun. Games shouldn’t make people feel bad. Hell, nothing should ever make anyone feel bad. Shouldn’t we just, you know, skip the whole death thing if it just hurts feelings?

No. That’s stupid. You’re stupid. It’s also impossible.

There are lots of Game Masters — especially Modern Game Masters — who think that anything that causes the players strife, upset, anger, grief, offense, or really any negative emotion should be avoided at all costs. These are just games for fun. They should never feel bad. Consequently, lots of you Game Masters have a hard time dealing out Character Death because it feels bad and you don’t want to do it. Many of you ignore the possibility until the moment it comes up in the game and that just leaves you paralyzed over how to deal with it.

Avoiding negative emotions is a noble goal, but it’s an impossible one. Partly because people are people and every interaction carries a risk of discomfort and negativity but also partly because anything you’re emotionally invested in can hurt your feelings. If you’re playing a sports and you care at all about winning, you’re gonna be sad if you lose. Same with video games. The more invested you are, the more it hurts when shit doesn’t go your way and if shit is always guaranteed to go your way, you’re not really playing a game anymore and you’re consequently not as invested in the outcome.

Everything that feels really good comes packaged with the risk of feeling bad. The better the good feelings, the more painful the bad. Shielding your players from unpleasant feelings does them no favors. You can’t shield them from every bad feeling but the more you do, the less equipped they are to handle it when bad feelings come up. It’s not just that players who aren’t forced to face Character Death don’t learn to cope with Character Death, it’s that they also become less and less capable of coping with any loss or setback.

You absolutely cannot let your fear of unpleasant feelings — and your players’ objections to such — write your rules and policies. All you’re doing is creating brittle players and a shit game and when your players discover they can bully you by throwing tantrums, they’re gonna make you miserable until you quit gaming.

Accept Death As It Is But Don’t Be a Dick About It

True Campaign Managers neither shy away from Character Death to avoid their players’ sad feelings nor do they lecture their players about how sad feelings are stupid and how it’s only a game. They treat Character Death — or any loss, setback, or negative outcome — as a natural part of the game that arises when it arises, but they treat their players with compassion so that, when they do come up, they’ve got space to feel feelings about it.

Within reason. Always within reason. Everything within reason.

So You Killed a Character

You can’t come up with a plan, policy, or procedure to deal with Character Death unless you know what you’re actually dealing with. What, exactly, needs to be dealt with? Why is Character Death a thing that needs dealing with?

Now, keep in mind that I ain’t talking about how you decide when and whether characters die. Characters die when they die. There are rules for that shit and they’re perfectly fine rules. You can change them if you want to, but that’s not what True Campaign Managery is about. What I’m discussing here is what happens after Adam blows his last Death Save or whatever and says, “Ardrick… Ardrick’s dead.”

When I talked about Experience and Advancement Systems, I told you that you should always start by reviewing the rules so you know exactly what they say and then walk through what’s likely to happen at the table when you follow those rules. So, let’s do the same thing here. Once again, I’m gonna use the Dungeons & Dragons rules as my example and I’m still running on 2014 firmware for reasons I’ve already explained.

The Final Word on the Final Word

The Dungeons & Dragons rulebooks are pretty clear about when characters die. When a character runs out of Hit Points and fails three Death Saves, they shuffle off the mortal coil. There’s also some shit about massive damage and there are several other effects scattered throughout the rules that can also render characters unalive, but none of this shit’s relevant here. I don’t care what kills characters, I care what comes after.

What do the rules say about that? Nothing. They say nothing. When a character dies, it dies. The end. Thanks, WotC, you’re a frigging peach!

I’m being hyperbolic here, but only a little. I sure ain’t lying. There are little bits of scattershot help to be found in the rules, but very little definitive and you really have to dig for it. But that’s not new. Character Death is one of those things that’s always been kind of on the Game Master to muddle through. Previous editions and other game systems have certainly offered more advice, guidelines, and even rules than The Latest Edition of One of the World’s Roleplaying Games, but whatever you’re playing, you’re not likely to find a good, complete, step-by-step guide to Player Character Postmortem Procedure.

“Ardrick… Ardrick’s Dead”

With very little guidance from the rules, we’re on our own to work out what to do after a character dies. And because of that lack of guidance, you might not even realize it’s as big an issue as it is unless you’ve dealt with it. So, let’s just use our prodigious imaginations — actually, let’s use my prodigious imagination since yours probably sucks — and think about what happens when Adam says the words, “Ardrick’s dead.” What happens? What comes up? What issues arise?

“He’s What?”

If you’ve ever killed a character, you know the words “Ardrick’s dead” hit the table like a fart in church during a funeral. That’s why I gave that whole rant about feelings and how they’re real and valid and shit. Regardless of how you think players — and Game Masters — should react to Character Death, there’s always a moment of shock when you drop a corpse on the table. It stops the game.

Now, Character Death hits every player differently, and its impact ain’t limited to just the corpse’s ex-player. Hell, unless you’re a complete asshat, you, the Game Master, are gonna feel some kinda way when a character dies. The potential feelings are too numerous and varied to list; I ain’t gonna try. I’m just acknowledging that issue number first arising from Character Death is that the entire emotional tenor of the table is gonna change. Drastically and instantly.

It’s worth noting, by the way, that this can be especially hard on you — the Game Master — because you’ve got feelings too — asshats notwithstanding — but you can’t stop to deal because you’ve got to navigate the whole group through this shit. That’s why you want plans and policies in place.

“Uhh… There’s Still a Murderous Dragon to Deal With”

So, Ardrick’s dead, and everyone’s feeling feelings. The problem is there’s also still a fantastical world of adventure whose sun is still revolving around it. The game world doesn’t stop just because a character’s dead and characters are rarely considerate enough to just drop dead during calm, quiet, no-stakes scenes. When a character dies, it’s usually because there’s some serious shit going on, and that all still needs resolving.

This whole thing’s both good and bad. It’s good because it gives you — the Game Master — something immediate and urgent to focus on to keep the game moving. It’s bad because the players — especially the ex-player and especially also you — probably feel a teensy bit stressed right now.

See, a character’s death creates a lot of uncertainty. Everyone’s got questions in their heads when a character dies. Questions like, “What are we going to do now?” and like, “Can we even afford to bring Ardrick back from the dead?” and like, “If my character’s dead, should I just go home?” It’s hard to focus until those questions get settled but those questions depend both on the in-world reality of the game and the out-of-game needs and wants of its players. So you really can’t address any of them if there’s still a battle raging in the game world.

There’s also pacing. Have I ever mentioned pacing? It never stops being a thing. You can’t just stop the game dead mid-scene because the players are dealing with the shock of a dead pretend elf. You have to get the game to a place where it can breathe a bit.

“Shut Up; You’re Dead!”

One of those uncertainties death creates is the dead character’s player’s status as a player. Without a character to play, a player can’t play the game. With Ardrick dead, Adam’s sidelined. He’s just sitting there. He’s not playing anymore. Realistically, he’s not supposed to be playing anymore. With no character, he has no way to play.

Thus, along with the initial shock of the death and whatever the hell is happening in the game at the moment of the death, there’s also a player out of play.

Before all y’all start yelling your favorite, brilliant solution to this dilemma in my comment section or in the Angry Article Discussion Discord channel, let me remind you that all we’re doing now is identifying issues. We’re trying to list everything that’s a problem when a character dies. We’ll come up with policies and plans next time.

“What Do We Do Now?”

Ardrick’s dead, Adam’s sitting quietly waiting to see if he ever gets to play again, and the party has extricated themselves from whatever emergency killed Ardrick in the first place. Once the other players have breathing room, someone’s gonna say, “What do we do now?”

No matter what, as soon as a character dies, all of the players’ plans are on hold because death totally changes the in-game situation. Purely mechanically, a dead character costs the party a huge chunk of their resource pool and it might rob them of vital skills and leave an important party role completely unfilled. That raises the question of whether it’s reasonable to even continue the adventure. “Can we do this without our tank,” is a totally fair and valid question and the answer ain’t gonna be trivial.

But tabletop roleplaying games run on continuity and permanence and consequence. If the characters retreat in the middle of an adventure to recruit a new warm body or whatever, it might not affect anything or it might allow the cultists of Shrub Niggurath to finish their ritual and send the kingdom into leafy madness. It all depends on the stakes and conditions of the current adventure.

Then, too, there are roleplaying considerations to considerate. They may not matter at every table, but at some tables, they’re what matters most. Is the party duty-bound to bring Ardrick’s body back to his family? Should they give him a field burial? Can they just burn the body or leave it for the wolves or whatever?

Of course, these questions are affected too by whatever fantastical possibilities might exist — and the players are going to ask — to reverse the death or death-like condition. You don’t want to toss your ex-buddy on a pyre if you might be able to reunite it with his soul. Moreover, if there’s an expiry date on the corpse after which you can’t re-alive it, that’s going to affect the “Do we keep on trucking” calculation.

In case it ain’t super obvious, the whole “What do we do now?” question is super context-sensitive. It depends really heavily on what’s going on in the game and what possibilities exist and what’s at stake and who the characters are as people and so on. The only thing you can say for sure in the general case is that this discussion is going to be a whole, giant-ass thing. Expect it to chew up a lot of table time.

Oh, there’s also the huge meta-issue. Can’t forget that.

“Can My Ghost Say Something Here?”

Ardrick’s dead, Adam’s sitting off to one side waiting to see what happens next, and the party’s out of immediate danger and working out the withertos and wherefores of their next move. They’re going to be at it a while and whatever they decide is going to determine how the next session — and probably the next several — play out.

Do you know who, at the table, has an immensely high stake in how things play out over the next several sessions? That’s right: it’s you. The Game Master. But do you know who else, at the table, has an immensely high stake in how things play out over the next several sessions? It’s the ex-character’s former player; that’s who. Adam’s participation in the game is totally in Limbo. If his character can come back from the dead, he might be able to rejoin the game as Ardrick. Otherwise, he needs to make a new character and that new character has to join the group. But if the party decides to continue their current adventure because the stakes are too high to retreat, Adam might be stuck waiting for several sessions before Ardrick can return to the Land of the Living. Or until he — and you — can bring his new character into the fold.

Now, do you know who, at the table, technically has no part in discussing the party’s future plans? That’s right: it’s you and Adam. You don’t get a say because it’s the players’ call. It’s an Agency thing. They’ve got to decide what risks to take and consequences to chance and costs to pay. Adam doesn’t get a say because he has no character and therefore he has no voice in the world.

Again, chill out before you comment. I know there are ways to surmount these issues — that’s the whole reason I’m writing this shit — but I’m pointing out that these are issues and whatever plans and policies you implement — as a Campaign Manager — have to take them into account.

The death of a character totally disrupts the party’s plans. It changes everything. By the strict definition of a roleplaying game, the players — and their characters — have to make whatever choices they feel are best about how to proceed after they put one of their own in the ground. Those choices will likely have serious, far-reaching, permanent consequences in the campaign because that’s how roleplaying games work. But those choices also affect how and whether and when the ex-player gets to rejoin the game and it constrains how you, the Game Master, can and must handle that. Your job is to adjudicate the players’ actions, not dictate them and corpses aren’t party members and can’t take actions other than rotting. That’s how it be. And the solution can’t be, “Well, the Campaign Manager just has to make up a solution when the issue arises.”

Imagine your players are on a ticking timebomb adventure you planned to fill four sessions. Ardrick just died two encounters into the first session. The stakes are so high the players don’t feel they can retreat to deal with Ardrick. You know that, by the time the adventure’s over, Ardrick’s corpse won’t be fresh enough to reinvigorate. Oh, and the adventure is in a demon stronghold in the Abyssal Void. The player-characters needed the magical equivalent of Class A Personal Protective Equipment just to walk through the door so they ain’t going to run into random wanderers or prisoners to team up with. Solve that trivial little issue on the spot why don’t you? Because solve it you must. Immediately. At the very least, Adam needs to know whether he’s out of the game for a month or not. Meanwhile, if you’re just going to change the rules and the stakes to let the players have breathing room to get Ardrick back in play, well, you might as well have just fudged the dice to prevent his death in the first place. You’re just erasing the consequences because they’re too hard and painful.

I’m not trying to debate the issue here. I just want to make it very clear how thorny Character Death can become and why you need to be ready for it. As ready as you possibly can be, anyway. Because the real biggest issue is just the uncertainty it creates.

Restore, Restart, or Quit

Of course, one of the big factors playing into what the party does next is whether or not the fatality is reversible. Now, technically, that’s a rules matter and not a Campaign Management issue. Either your game includes spells and magical items that can un-dead the dead — or whatever — or it doesn’t. But the whole raising the dead thing is something lots of Game Masters like to fiddle with. Moreover, even when the possibility exists, mechanically, there are questions about both the cost and availability of those options. In D&D, for example, if your party doesn’t have a member of the right class at the right level to provide a magical Control-Z on the death, you’ve got to rely on an NPC spellcaster to do the deed that undoes the death. But the rules are all kind of, “Effed if I know, just ask your GM” about whether NPC spellcasters are available. Then, too, there are the hundreds or thousands of gold pieces worth of diamonds you need to power the spell.

Once again, this ain’t something you — as a Game Master — want to have to figure out on the spot. You want to know what un-deadifying options exist before you need them.

But there’s also a big meta-issue here too. Raising the dead ain’t ever cheap in any system. The players have to figure out if they’re willing and able to pay the bill. But the one player with the most at stake in that call also gets no say in it. And that makes things more complicated than you think. Because now there are feelings on the line.

Imagine Beth’s been saving her coins for months for a very expensive magical item that’s central to her character and she’s almost there. If Beryllia shells out for Ardrick’s resurrection, that’ll set her back months. But Beth also has to worry whether Adam’s feelings might be hurt if she doesn’t pony up the coins. She might feel pressured to give in. The whole party might. You might think that’s how it should be, you might not, but it is a very uncomfortable social issue that has to be navigated.

Then, too, resurrection is never instantaneous. The spell might be, but often getting it cast requires the party to return to a safe location or to find an NPC who can pull it off. That can get time-consuming. If the party needs to raise the money or acquire rare components or do a quest to the Underwhere to retrieve the lost soul, that might drag things out even more. So what’s Adam doing while the party’s hunting down dead-raising priests and searching Hades for Ardrick’s mojo? And what if they fail?

“Hi, My Name is Ardrick II. Have You Seen My Brother?”

In the end, it might not be possible to return a wayward character to the Material Plane. Maybe the option doesn’t exist. Maybe whatever happened is too final to reverse. Maybe the party can’t come up with the resources or pull off the quest or they just don’t want to try. Or maybe the player in question is happier with a fresh start. So, a new character must be created. Well, what’s that look like? You know the player’s gonna have some questions for you, the Game Master, right?

The first question’s going to have to do with Levels or Experience or Advancement Points or whatever the hell your game system uses to extrinsically mark character growth and progression. The second question will have something to do with starting gear, cashy-money, and magical doodads. The remaining questions will be about backstory and reasons for being and all that shit.

Basically, everything you — the Campaign Manager — have to answer when the players make their first characters, you’re going to have to answer again — probably differently — whenever anyone makes a replacement character. For any reason. You’re gonna need a policy for introducing new characters in the middle of the game.

“You Seem Trustworthy. Why Don’t You Join Us On Our Quest?”

The final big issue in this hit parade of postmortem problems involves introducing and incorporating new characters into the game. How does that happen? Or — because the specifics are going to vary wildly — what’s your general plan or policy for incorporating a new character into the game? What can a player expect when they’re waiting in the wings, new character in hand, to join the game?

So This Is What Death Is Like

So that’s Character Death. Or, rather, that’s all the different ways Character Death fucks up a campaign. From the moment of initial shock that arises when someone announces they’re dead all the way through to the moment — possibly several sessions later — when their brand new character joins the campaign. It’s a giant-ass disruption and it can literally derail a game for weeks. That’s why it’s so important to have a policy. You have to know how to compromise on all of the issues every step of the way to minimize the disruption without making the death trivial and without damaging the spirit of the roleplaying game. Along the way, you have to be keenly aware of the players’ emotions and the potential conflicts they can cause. And you’ve got to do it all knowing the circumstances surrounding each and every death are totally different and unique and there’s no single, universal approach that’ll prepare you to handle each and every one.

Should be super easy to explain that all in under 5,000 words, huh? I guess we’ll find out next time.