How to avoid killing your player characters as GM

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Varyon

A lot of players want the catharsis of dishing out some ultraviolence, and may enjoy the challenge of a fair fight - or even one where the odds are against them. Sure, this might not be the ultimate goal of the character (although it certain still can be - consider Kenpachi from Bleach, or, for a less-extreme version, Nil from Horizon: Zero Dawn), but it's what the players find to be fun. And at the end of the day, the purpose of an RPG is having fun.

Now, personally, I love it when a plan comes together and the party is victorious due to superior manipulation of events and the battlefield rather than because the dice were on their side this time (although the latter can certainly be fun too). But not all players are going to be like me - plenty want to be able to just Leeroy Jenkins their way into a fight. And sometimes having disposable characters is the way to go - from what I understand, the playtesters all had a blast in the Delvers to Grow meatgrinder. But when it isn't, you'll need some options to keep the characters alive despite their best attempts to off themselves.

I gotta note that a fair fight means you're 50% likely to lose it. (A fight that would be fair except you have superior manipulation of events and the battlefield is not a fair fight.)

I haven't seen anybody who wants that at a tabletop. In video games where there's a fairly tight die-retry loop, that's another story.

(Unless you implement that loop in your tabletop game, which is...definitely a thing you could do.)