Category: RPG Tips (Page 3 of 3)

In D&D and other games, I’ve found that having a character die can be deflating, especially if it’s near the end of a campaign. I’ve discussed a ‘Taken Out’ rule variant with my Thursday group (which we’ve adopted for my Redmark campaign), but I’ll list some other house rules for dealing with Character Death. Let me know what you think. I’ll probably use one of these variants for any future games and campaigns I run.

1. Instant Death

This is rules-as-written in most games. Once you mechanically die, your character is dead (unless magically resurrected), and this happens instantly. Note that this can be deflating or awkward if it happens early in a game session and the player doesn’t have a new character ready to play.

2. Mortal Wound

Once you mechanically die, your character is marked for death and you’ll cross the threshold soon. The GM will tell you when. Generally your character will stabilize and become conscious but with a mortal wound that cannot be healed. The GM may allow you to play your character until the end of that game session or whenever your GM determines makes the best narrative sense, with no chance of resurrection.

3. Taken Out

When you’re character mechanically dies, the GM give the player a choice: your character can die (your GM will tell you when), or they can be Taken Out. Taken Out means you give the GM temporary extra narrative control over the scene which supersedes other rules. The character doesn’t die but is knocked unconscious and dragged off by monsters, mind-controlled by a mesmerist and flees as an ally of their new master, incapacitated by disease and powerless to move without healing, or other similar outcome. The surviving ally characters cannot intervene to prevent this from happened; it simply happens, and with the character off-scene, the surviving characters have a new quest: to save or heal the affected character. Note that being taken out doesn’t mean there is no consequence. The character may lost their possessions and return forever changed by their experience.

4. Last Breath

When you’re dying you take your Last Breath. You catch a glimpse of the afterlife or the celestial world that awaits (the GM will describe it). Then roll 2d6 (just roll, no modifiers).

On a 10 or higher, you’ve cheated death — you’re in a bad spot but you’re still alive and stabilized.

On a 7–9, a celestial power will offer you a bargain. Take the pact and stabilize or refuse and pass into the realm of Death. The bargain will usually be a quest that will come at great cost, often changing your character’s personality and goals.

On 6 or lower, your fate is sealed. You’re marked for death and you’ll cross the threshold soon. The GM will tell you when. Generally your character will stabilize and become conscious but with a mortal wound that cannot be healed. The GM may allow you to play your character until the end of that game session or whenever your GM determines makes the best narrative sense.

The Last Breath is that moment standing between life and death. Time stands still and the dying character glimpses the afterlife. This could be anything from a Force Ghost, a guardian angel, or Death himself. Even those who do not pass beyond into eternity catch a glimpse of the other side and what might await them — friends and enemies past, rewards or punishment for acts in life or other, stranger vistas. All are changed in some way by this moment—even those who escape.

The key thing to remember is that a brush with death, succeed or fail, is a significant moment that should always lead to change.

(Above text was inspired by Dungeon World. Note that this allows you to play out the scene where Luke has a force vision when dying on Hoth, or Thorin is dying and having a monologue after the Battle of Five Armies in The Hobbit.)

5. Heroes Never Die

Best used in games with Superpowers or in a campaign of high pulp, with this rule, characters who die don’t actually die but instead are unconscious and stabilized, and will regain consciousness after the current scene.

So are GM Screens helpful?

History

The original DM’s Screen of the mid to late 70s was a 3 ring binder which you used to hide your maps and monster stats.

Gary Gygax and his Dungeon

Generally these could be in your lap or propped up on the table.

Stranger Things 3 Ring DM Binder

Later, D&D modules often included a cardboard map which you could pull out and use with one side as a player facing art, and the internal side being the dungeon map.

GM Screen Uses

The primary uses for a GM screen are:

• Hiding GM maps
• Hiding miniatures of upcoming monsters
• Hiding upcoming props and handouts
• Hiding GM dice rolls
• Providing a GM quick reference

I’ve done some online polling in the past, and generally what I find is that 2/3s of GMs of D&D style games prefer using a GM screen (which makes sense since they have maps and miniatures to hide), whereas about 2/3s of GMs running non-D&D style games prefer NOT to use a GM screen.

Stan’s Technique

It’s all a matter of personal preference of course, but here’s my preferences:

For D&D Style Games

I like to use a thinner version of what amounts to a 3 Ring binder. It’s a two-panel restaurant menu with inserts — art for the players side and a portfolio of clear sleeves (cut out from an art display binder) on the inside. I use it just like a 3 ring binder (in my lap or propped up on the table) but its a lot lighter.

• Hiding GM maps — I have them as an insert in the restaurant binder
• Hiding miniatures of upcoming monsters — I have a wood chest next to the GMs chair I use for that
• Hiding upcoming props and handouts — I hide these in a folder next to the GMs chair
• Hiding GM dice rolls — I usually roll in the open, or if needed, hide the roll with my hand
• Providing a GM quick reference — I have GM cheat sheets, stat blocks, and adventure notes in the two-panel restaurant menu

Another technique I’ve used is to use a traditional GM screen which GM reference notes but to lay it down on the table — essentially a placemat with a rules cheat sheet.

For Non-D&D Style Games

Usually I do the above, but with a digest sized 3 ring binder, such as my Traveller binder.

Why the smaller footprint? I like the smaller footprint (easier to see over), but whereas D&D has so many maps from modules that look best at 8.5×11″, in story games or Traveller, I don’t have to worry about large maps so I go with my preferred smaller digest size.

Conclusion

It’s all personal preferences, but those are mine! I especially don’t like having to reach over a GM screen to draw maps, and I don’t like hiding dice.

I love the slightly-oversized dice from Role 4 Initiative, so I just ordered a new set for use with Cortex Prime. Quite affordable — only $0.63 per die. I am using different colors for each die type to make it easy to differentiate at the table (and also its great for players new to RPGs who have trouble telling a d10 from a d12, etc.). I’m using Purple for d4s, Green for d6s, Blue for d8s, Red for d10s, and Black for d12s. I’m red-green color blind but these shades are bright and distinct enough even for me to tell apart. Can’t wait to use them in my upcoming Cortex Plus campaign!

You can find them here: https://r4i.us/product-category/dice/

I did some experimentation with creating one inch tokens for use in games where acquiring minis is expensive or impractical but when you still want something to represent character placement (roughly) on a map.

Supplies needed: 1″ flexible stick-on magnets, a 1″ paper punch, clear Epoxy 1″ Stickers for Bottle Cap Pendants, and some character images sized and printed to fit in 1″ circles.

The hole punch worked well to cut out the images.

The next step is to stick the cutout images on the magnets. I was originally going to add in a layer of a 1″ wood token using a glue stick, but the tokens weren’t quite 1″ so I ended up skipping that step.

Final step was to press on the Epoxy clear stickers which gives the token some weight and makes it easier to grip.

I plan to store these on a small magnetic marker board and use a bigger magnetic marker board to draw rough maps using the tokens for quick character placement. You could pick up the board and the tokens will magnetically stay in place!