this post was submitted on 12 Sep 2023
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Played a control/support wizard for almost two years. Died to a power word kill and BBG used his soul as a bargaining chip. Party was too full of themselves and newer players, they called his bluff, my wizard was perma dead. The rest of the session was them as players and characters coming to terms with his death. It was god damn beautiful and one of my favorite memories in gaming.
Please DMs, kill your ~~players~~ player's characters. For the character development.
Edit: being neurodivergent I sometimes forget that people can have personal feelings that I find illogical, so as the comment under mine says; please make sure your player or players are not going to be traumatized if you kill their characters. As a DM I have always done this, because even if they are killed off I want the players input on how it goes, but that is for narrative reasons and I had not considered how badly it could have gone if I hadn't been asking. I have never been asked by a DM, it just doesn't bother me because to me it is a part of the fun and magic of TTRPGs.
I've also seen players devastated by character death. The correct advice is to check in with your players about what they want to do with possible character death. Don't just spring it on players who don't want it.
I had two player characters foolishly break into a vampire wizard's office to try to steal something. It was a series of incredibly foolish decisions, starting with "let's split the party", and it escalated to violence. When it was looking especially grim, I asked them if they would be okay with character death. They said yes. The two characters died.
The in-game funeral for them was fantastic. Real tears. But the important thing is they consented to this. If they had wanted these characters to live, it would've been a dick move to be like "nah they dead". There's no reason to make the players real-life extra upset. I don't have the hubris to think I know better what kind of story they want.
You are absolutely right, and I have always got buy in from players, I just never thought about how badly things could have gone if I hadn't been doing that so I have edited my comment. For narrative reasons I always think players should have a say in their characters death, it helps me as a DM and can lead to fantastic world building opportunities. Thankfully I've never killed a PC without consent for that reason.
I read the second paragraph first and interpreted it as “kill the person playing the character and make someone else play them so that the character will have a different personality.”
I play versions of myself in a fantasy setting. I emphasize a particular part of my personality and give them funny voices, so no one has caught on. Thankfully people tend to like me for some reason, and therefore my characters, but that is why I always forget to make the player versus player character distinction.