50 Ways To Die

Getting killed in a game should be fun.

Is that too radical a statement? Perhaps. Certainly it might seem a little…um…morbid.

But honestly, isn’t it part of the game? And by “the game” I am of course referring to The Great Game, aka Dungeons & Dragons, the fantasy RPG of choice for O So Many young (and not so young) folks.

Well, at least it used to be part of the game. Dying, that is. But apparently someone did a study or there was a bunch of complaints such that game designers came to the conclusion that “dying just ain’t all that fun.”

I mean, I ASSUME that’s what happened. Something like that, right?

To me, I’m afraid it smacks of the same annoying whine that causes professors to give out better grades than students deserve…it’s not EXACTLY the same thing but it’s akin to it. Basically people complaining that they can’t really take what they’re O So Ready to dish out. That as a DM, my sole responsibility is to entertain players...by putting fish in a barrel and allowing them to shoot, rather than arming the fish with a fighting chance.

Ah, well. It's a different world with different “new fangled” attitudes, what can I say? People want to be heroic…and even Old School players that don’t want to be heroic (folks like my buddy, Kris) tell me:

JB, dying is no fun.

Well, dammit…it should be!

If you’re playing an Old School D&D game, dying is probably nigh inevitable, REGARDLESS OF HOW GOOD A PLAYER YOU ARE. I say that with all seriousness and in all honesty. You can take all the precautions you want, play as carefully as you want, exit the dungeon for “rest” as much as you want…but eventually your number will be up and you’ll be dead.

Sometimes it will be a blown save versus an auto-kill effect. Sometimes an opponent will luck out with an incredibly telling blow at just the wrong time. Sometimes your DM will simply make a mistake in setting an encounter that is too tough for the players. Or he’ll run your characters through some death trap...like S1: Tomb of Horrors.

In Old School D&D, death happens to every character eventually. That’s been my experience, anyway.

And really, it’s nothing to fear greatly. The game has built-in remedies for death in the form of Resurrection and Wish and Raise Dead spells…not to mention Neutralize Poison and Stone to Flesh for those “auto-kill” problems. Death is NOT supposed to be the end of the fun…it’s just one of the hazards of the game. And for those characters that are too low of level (and too weak or too poor) to make use of Raise Dead, need I mention that B/X D&D is a snap for rolling up new characters?

[one of these days I’m going to time myself to see how long it actually takes]

SO, all righty then…no need to fear death. It’s “fixable” at the mid-to-high levels and negligible at the low levels (now for folks playing with the Homes’s “7 sessions to level up” instead of the speedier B/X, I do sympathize for you, but you’re already a BADASS to play a game without Raise Dead, so I guess it really is “your funeral,” pal). To me, death’s simply a speed bump to one’s gaming life and certainly not the end of the world.

However, it CAN be tedious if done in a boring fashion. And tedious does NOT equal “fun.”

That’s why I strongly endorse poisoned characters writhing on the floor in agony for ten rounds while frothing at the mouth. I also heartily recommend deaths by traps, as they are often unexpected and thus interesting (I’ll need to post about this later). Furthermore, I’m honestly not convinced DMs use enough petrifaction in their games…bring out those medusas and basilisks!

Now combat, of course, is the real culprit for boring death. Oh, yeah, sure…you put all the responsibility for making combat “interesting” on the DM, don’t you? After all, in D&D (unlike some RPGs) it’s up to the poor, over-worked DM to interpret combat rolls and make things livelier than “you hit” or “you miss AGAIN.” It’s all on US to keep it from tedium.

But what about when the DM’s monster or NPC kills a player character?

Well, sure, that’s on the DM too, right? Except players have this funny little thing I’ve noticed when it comes to DMs describing their character’s death in combat…it has this tiny little problem of sometimes breeding a little resentment if “done wrong.”

After all, the player’s character has been reduced to 0 hit points and that’s “bad enough;” it means the player is going to have to take a penalty Time Out (to roll up a new character or wait for the Raise Dead spell). But graphically describing a PC’s death…even when it isn’t done in a gleeful fashion…can sound a little too much like GLOATING to your average player.

Shocking, right? Oh, please…it’s human nature for the DM to want to gloat a little bit regarding the demise of a PC. After all, the PCs have been spending the whole game session triumphing over every last monster they’ve encountered. Finally, the DM gets to score a little point of his own…and not on some “DM fiat-style” death trap like out of the Tomb of Horrors. No, this is a kill in COMBAT, baby. That’s beating the players at their own game…that’s hitting ‘em on their own turf!

But rather than risk the gripes of disgruntled players, DMs have this maddening tendency to TONE DOWN the descriptive narrative when a PC hits 0 hit points. To the detriment of everyone, in my opinion. Here’s kind of how it goes:

DM: Roll to hit!

Player 1: I get a 15!

DM (rolling damage): Your sword nicks off the ogre’s ear, he gives a blood curdling yell of rage; Joe your turn!

Player 2 (Joe): I roll a 7.

DM: Your character lunges under the ogre’s guard, but his blade is barely deflected at the last moment! The ogre brings his club down on your armored form (rolls) and hits! You take (rolls)…uh-oh. Ten points of damage.

Joe: Damn, I only had nine.

DM (sympathetically): Sorry, man. You’re killed. Okay, everyone else roll for initiative….


You see how lame that is? The DM can be worked up into a frothing lather every round of every combat, talking and jiving at a frenetic pace and then someone dies and it’s like, oh sorry about that, tough break man, I didn’t mean to hit you so hard (yeah, right…I was trying to hit you AS HARD AS POSSIBLE AND ON PURPOSE!), your character’s down to 0 hit points, everyone else roll for initiative.

DMs try to brush it off. Downplay it. Yes, some may feel bad. Some may give a wry chuckle, or make a low-key humorous remark. Some may gloat (secretly), but they certainly don’t sneer and say, “Take THAT, pal! In Your FACE!”

Which, of course, players do all the time.

The DM is supposed to be an impartial referee. The DM is also supposed to be the antagonist and opposition. The DM is supposed to practice non-attachment to the outcome. The DM is also supposed to challenge the players and put their characters in mortal danger.

I know it’s a balancing act…I’ve been doing it for years and I know it ain’t easy. But it should be. It should at least be easy to be NOT BORING.

Because that’s the real Cardinal Sin here. Yes, DMs: it IS bad form to gloat over a player death (DMs have all the power after all). On the other hand, if you bring a PC to zero hit points in combat, you can’t be so scared of hurting someone’s feelings that you tone down your descriptive prose. Deaths – ESPECIALLY deaths in combat!!! – should be AT LEAST as memorable as the guy who tripped over his 10’ pole, hurtling ass-over-teakettle onto a bunch of poison spikes. A death in combat…what the Norsemen would have called “a good death” …should be AT LEAST as interesting as Black Dougal frothing on the floor while his buddy Frederik goes through his earthly possessions.

Your players deserve better than, “oh yeah…and Joe got killed by an ogre.”

Since many players aren’t going to believe that your gory descriptions are anything other than gloating and showboating at their expense, I offer you this alternative:

50 WAYS TO DIE

Another one page, random chart in pdf format. It works like this: print it up, keep it close by (consider wedging it into the pages of your rule book next to your combat charts). Whenever one of your monsters or NPCs brings a PC to 0 hit points in combat, IMMEDIATELY roll a D% and read the description. Feel free to re-roll or adjust the description slightly to make it more appropriate to the weapons being used by the PCs opponent.

Unlike other fantasy RPGs (DragonQuest, Stormbringer, Warhammer FRP), D&D doesn’t have critical hits…characters are fine until they’re not. This table borrows a page for all those “other games” but the gory description it uses is ONLY for that final lucky (or unlucky depending on your perspective) attack.

Go get ‘em guys!
; )

Poison - One More Time

I got an email from Grey over at Pen & Sword regarding my recent poison posts. He had some interesting ideas himself on how to handle poison in the D&D game, but once again stated for the record how much he hates the "instant death" aspect of poison.

Okay...let's talk about this for a second.

If a person is killed by poison, it takes only a cleric with the 4th level spell Neutralize Poison and the 5th level spell Raise Dead to bring the poor sap back to life. If you're playing B/X and your cleric can get to the victim within 10 rounds, all you need is the 4th level spell. All clerics have access to all spells, so long as they have the ability to cast a particular level of spell.

So, what about petrification?

It may not be an auto "kill" but it takes your character out of the game just the same if you fail your saving throw. Does this mean you folks that prefer D20 don't use medusae, and gorgons, and basilisks, and cockatrices, etc.?

And the only way to recover someone from being turned to stone? A 6th level spell that your magic-user might or might not have in his/her spell book.

Is petrification somehow more "fair" than poison? It seems like a more dangerous proposition to me, seeing as how it makes a player sit out 'cause their character is stoned (and not in a good way). And as far as I can remember, most characters' saving throws are better against poison than against petrification.

So give me a break. Instant kill from poison is NOT what people are complaining about, really. It's using poison to excess.

Like alcohol, poison should be used in moderation...not "oh no, make a poison save against the locked chest AGAIN." Not every lock has contact poison spread on it. What? You think some castle lord or wizard has time to re-apply that stuff (oh-so-carefully) after every time he opens his chest to admire his loot? Think again.

A few monsters are poisonous...snakes and spiders mostly with a couple others (the aforementioned medusa and the dastardly purple worm) having much larger worries than their poisonous attack. And those snakes and spiders have to hit you first before forcing the save...in effect giving you a double save against poison, where the first save is made using your armor class.

So please folks: leave the poison in. At least don't hold it up on such a pedestal of doom when there are so many other dangers (like a vorpal sword wielding fighter) to cry about.

Jeez!

; )

The Art of Auto-Kill

No, we’re not talking about vehicular homicide or Car Wars.

One of the great things about the Tom Moldvay edited Basic set is the many wonderful examples present throughout the text. Like Pat over at O2BD, I find these examples entertaining reading, as well as illustrative of game play. I wish I had more room in my B/X Companion to include similar examples, perhaps even re-visiting the characters (Morgan, Silver Leaf, Sister Rebecca) introduced in Moldvay’s game.

As a young lad teaching himself to play (no mentor for me), these examples helped shape my views on how the game should go. And one thing in the text that seems fairly different from later edition examples is the frequency and regularity of player character death. Not henchmen, not nameless torch bearers, but the death of actual PLAYER characters. In two solid examples (one of combat, one of dungeon exploration) we have an equal number of PCs dying through misadventure (one during combat, another from a poison trap).

I believe these examples were fairly influential to my “gaming development” as a youngster. Later, I would get my own copy of the AD&D Dungeon Master’s Guide (a tome written earlier than Moldvay’s) which provides even more gruesome examples on the mortality of player characters (the party on party combat is deadly enough, but then the “snacking ghouls?” yowza!).

Put these examples together and perhaps you’ll see why I didn’t feel inclined to give much mercy to the player characters in my games.

Oh, that’s not to say there may not have been “fudging” with dice on occasion (though I can’t seem to recall any off-hand…maybe that didn’t begin till later with the far more “wiggly” Marvel Superheroes RPG) for some dramatic imperative or other, but mostly we let the chips (and dice) fall as they did. After all, a character could always be raised or wished back to life, right?

As far as I was concerned, my job as DM was to challenge the players as hard as possible while still being “fair and balanced.” Monsters/NPCs were to be played to the best of their ability and PCs were richly rewarded…if they survived.

‘Course, if they DO survive the whole job of “challenging” the players (i.e. attempting to kill them off in a fair and balanced manner) can become desperately hard.

[yes, if this smacks of the text in Hackmaster, that’s a fair assessment of how we played the game back in the day...probably one of the reasons I find so much humor in the HM texts. Of course, I wasn’t nearly as stingy with the treasure as a true “Hackmaster certified” GM should be]

It didn’t help that early on we were calculating hit points wrong. High level characters are just damn tough to kill anyway…they already have obscene armor classes and hitting power thanks to their magical accoutrements. Then add onto that their excellent saving throws and few have anything to fear from giant scorpions or the gaze of a medusa. Remember that early (pre-3rd) editions of D&D are NOT “scalable;” target numbers (for attacks and saves) don’t rise along with player level. Once something becomes easy, it remains easy, which can make the job of a “Killer DM” (like me) extremely tough. At least, if one is playing “fair.”

Which is why modules like S1: Tomb of Horrors were such a boon…so many traps and tricks that “broke” the normal rules of the game…and yet did so in an “official capacity” (with TSR stamped right on the cover). This wasn’t some random DM making an “impossibly hard” dungeon; this was official licensed product, certainly tested rigorously in the field!

However, the number of modules we ran was small in comparison to the number of adventures we created. After all, you could only “solve” a module once, after which it was “forever cleaned out”…at least in our on-going, continuous campaign world.

SO…since I would have felt like I was acting un-fair to create killer traps like the ones in Tomb of Horrors, I strove to find ways of offing my players’ characters in-game using only the “proper” methods open to me…i.e. the stuff in the books. And the best method of doing that is including auto-kill items in the game.

By “auto-kill” I really mean “auto-effect:” effects that occur (in general) without saving throw. This is to avoid the frustration of trying to poison or hex a character that (in addition to being high level) is sporting cloaks of protection and periapts of proof against poison and rings of spell turning.

The archetypal example of an “auto-kill” weapon is the vorpal sword. If the enemy rolls high enough, the opponent/victim is decapitated (dead-dead-dead) with no saving throw, and regardless of hit points.

However, I almost NEVER included vorpal weapons in the game. They were fairly useless for my purpose, being extremely random in action (high level characters having a good enough AC that the sword would only hit on a 19 or 20) and difficult to justify in-game (I wasn’t simply stocking the dungeons with random, high-level fighters!). Not to mention, giving a monster/NPC a vorpal weapon meant giving the party a vorpal weapon as there would undoubtedly be some survivors that would claim the blade. Also, when stocking dungeons I generally rolled treasure randomly (“more fair”)…in all the years I played D&D I can only ever remember one PC ever owning a vorpal blade, and that was one of mine!

A better example (for my purposes) would be the garrote from the Unearthed Arcana. Why have a thief backstab someone for a measly x3 or x4 damage when you could auto-kill ‘em in a couple rounds, no saving throw? Simple and effective.

Similarly, why include a sphere of annihilation (releasing a powerful item into the game), when you could give characters a deck of many things to play with instead? There were monsters that fit the bill for this kind of thing (it seems to me jermalain fit the bill, as did rot grub and mind flayers) as well as some high level spells (imprisonment, irresistable dance) but most of them escape my memory right now…it’s been years since I combed through books looking for proper “secret weapons” to unload on my players.

After all, I’m not a killer DM anymore.

[by the way, artifacts and relics might SEEM like a way to auto-kill…or auto-screw…players, but they didn’t work for my purposes. As I said, I tried to be FAIR, using only those things already in the game, and CHOOSING terrible, awful malevolent effects would have been akin to CHEATING…besides which most of my players would have felt that the negative side effects out-weighed any potential benefit of artifacts and relics anyway. That’s a subject for a whole different post, really]

No, I don’t attempt to off my players anymore. My “challenge dials” for RPGs are turned WAY down these days (except, perhaps, as a player). After all, I’m grown up and mature these days…I’m smart enough to recognize that the field is already tilted in the DM’s favor, and the REAL challenge is moderating the difficulty so that your players can have fun without A) getting overly slaughtered, or B) the DM being forced to “fudge” or call “do-overs.”

[come to think of it, I really find this a little sad, and to me it again raises the question, “why would anyone want to be a DM?”]

That being said, I still have an appreciation for auto-kill effects when I see ‘em, both as a DM and as a player (hammer of thunderbolts anyone?). And in reading through The Compleat Adventurer for more potential B/X classes, I see that there are a total of FOUR classes that have auto-kill abilities. They are:

- The Scout
- The Spy
- The Swordsman
- The Harlequin (!!)

Three of the four DO provide a saving throw of sorts…a roll under the Constitution of the victim prevents the auto-kill effect from occurring. However, as Con does not increase over time like true saving throws (in fact it DECREASES in AD&D…with every resurrection!) there are fairly good odds that even a low level NPC can take out a high level PC with one of these special attacks.

The last one of the four (the spy’s improved Waylay attack) does NOT have a save of any sort associated with it, but is instead represented by a percentage chance of success. However, since the success chance is based solely on the spy’s level (not the victim’s!) it’s a particularly mean effect.

Anyway, I have an increased respect for saving throws these days (and the ability of players to blow their rolls), so any B/X write-ups of new character classes will probably carry regular “save versus death” stipulations. Probably.

[by the way, I do NOT think there’s anything inherently “un-fair” about non-savable effects…whether we’re talking energy drain, Power Word Kill, or a rust monster attack. I think that D&D from its inception was full of certain irregular/unique obstacles ON PURPOSE that make the game both more challenging and less mechanical. “Dumbing down” everything to scalable dice rolls…whether attack versus armor, save versus effect, or skill versus difficulty…just turns the game into an exercise in rolling dice. And if I wanted to throw craps, I would. RPGs can be MORE than that, and the occasional “uh-oh! THAT’s outside the box!” helps to break that dice-throwing, probability-crunching boredom. At least for me]

: )