re-joining the party after a death

[Skarg]

Originally Posted by ecz

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Finally an asimmetrical party can create more problems to the GM for the balance of the adventures and the things he puts into .

For example if the players at a certain moment must climb a wall while a pack of dire wolves is running behid them, a 4d/DX for non climbers will probably kill the 32 points hero, while the 40+ points adventurers should be able to clear the obstacle.

As GM then I must think in advance a B plan to let to everyone the same fair chance to survive. ( in our example any player could notice with a 4d/IQ a different escape path not requiring the hard DX saving roll, like a big three that everyone can climb rolling 2d/DX). The 32 points PC could go there while his friends go for the wall. They will quietly target the wolves with bows and crossbows once they are in safe in a higher position.

I prefer not to balance things as if the universe should provide challenges balanced to the party's ability levels.

Rather, the situation and the players' choices lead to logical results. The more competent PCs, if they like their less experienced comrades, can take care not to get them into situations where they will die. This has been a consistent theme over the decades of play - what can you do to keep you and your comrades alive, so that they can go on to more adventures and become more capable and so on. But I think it's precious to keep that organic and in the hands of fate, circumstances, and effective play by the players.

It seems to me that having the game world ramp up undermines that and really isn't needed if the players take their responsibility for their PCs' (and NPC friends) seriously.


Oh, another notion too is having multiple characters per player. ITL briefly mentions this mode of play, which can be a bit tricky to handle and presents its own issues (a separate topic - I don't want to hijack this one), but if you're doing that, then it seems even clearer that a PC death is not something you'd need to bend the universe about.


And "oh" again, ecz mentioned it seemed unfair to have someone whose PC died start at 32, but it rather seems the opposite to me. That player built up a character through play, and then lost that character, so it seems entirely fair the experienced character would be dead and gone. Meanwhile, the characters who did not have their PCs die seem to me to entirely logically and rightly enjoy getting to have those characters be alive, and enjoy the benefits of whatever they gained during their successful play to that point. Any extra boons given to a replacement character to help them catch up to the players who kept their characters alive, by just giving them new characters who are experienced without playing to get that experience, would instead seem to me to be "unfair" to those players. It would also undermine the meaning of their successful (non-dying) play.