Do you remember your first character death? Was it memorable?
I usually GM, and NPC deaths don’t hit as hard. I don’t even remember my first. I lost a warlock in a D&D 5e game, but we were high level so raise dead was just right there. Not very impactful.
Last night, I had a player’s first character death ever in a game I’ve been running. It’s sort of Shadowrun + World of Darkness, using Fate for the rules. The player had learned a kind of magic I stole from Unknown Armies: If you take big risks now, you can do more powerful magic later. Blindly crossing a busy street might be a mild charge, but russian roulette would be a major charge.
The players were trying to investigate a warehouse for plot reasons. This player ends up by himself in the basement while the ground level is on fire (for player reasons). He finds an armed goon, a guy dressed like a doctor, and several unconscious people wired up to a machine.
The player goes, “I’m going to russian roulette for a charge.”
I go, “Are you sure? It’s all or nothing. No take backs. You get a major charge, or you die. You’d roll 1d6, and on a 6 you lose.”
They go, “Hmm okay.” The player tries to threaten the goon, but the dice don’t favor them. Now they’re in a slightly worse position, mechanically.
The player goes, “I’m going to roulette” and just rolls the die. No more discussion. It came up 6.
The rest of us are like, “Wait, what? You just…? Right then? That’s so… anti-climactic.”
I wasn’t sure what to do. I hadn’t expected them to so casually go for the big score! I thought it’d come up in a big climax scene, not a fully escapable conflict with an unarmed goon!
We talked a little about ways forward that keep the character but don’t cheapen the mechanic, but the player was like, “No, I rolled the dice on it and lost. His brains are all over the floor now.”
The player had to go sit on their own for a little while. They’re thinking of rejoining as an NPC they’d worked with, but said they absolutely do not want to use magic again.
This is one I’m going to remember for a while.
It was a Werewolf game, the character was built to die. The Storyteller wanted to teach the younger players that characters are not immortal. I had always wanted to play a female but never did because I did not want to play a man with boobs like so many authors end up writing. But since it was only supposed to be for a couple sessions I thought I would give it a try.
Being werewolf, death awaits you at every turn, I had no idea when I was going to happen. I actually ended up getting really attached to the character. I think the death came the 3rd session, but whenever it was, I was leaving for vacation for three weeks the next day. Everyone thought it was real and my absence from so many sessions made them all think I was super upset. Even the ST thought I was upset, having forgotten about my vacation.