My character died yesterday

My character died yesterday.

It's extra sad because it was the most work I've ever put into a background and story arc for a character and he only lasted like five sessions.

I once had a handcrafted, carefully designed and loved PC last 4 minutes, want to tell us your story user? We can commiserate over files of fallen character sheets.

No, not Black Leaf!

Bummerino.

Maybe talk about it with your GM if the character and their story is that important to you?

jesus just roll a new dude you fag it's a sheet of paper

Marcie, get out of here.
YOU'RE DEAD!
You don't exist anymore.

Not to piss on your character's grave, but that's actually a good reason why it's better to start out basic and add things as you go.

A character of mine's backstory did not come up much, but there were plenty of things that added to their story from the events of the game.

Death is but a door. Time is but a window.

Depending on the setting and GM obviously.

Make your next character a family member or close childhood friend

Had a game where the same PC died almost every encounter.
The group was confused but somehow never questioned how he'd die and showup just fine the next morning, up until it became relevant to the story.
the answer is cloning and nanomachines

Karma for making your own story arc and trivializing how the campaign relates to the character

He knew the risks.

Did you dissolve in a pit of acid?

Crap. Sorry to hear that man. Story of death?

>DM asks us to write up 2 pages on character backstory
>Says he'll be using the backstories to develop the plot of the game
>Write up something I thought was okay
>DM tells other player in secret that he didn't like my story and didn't want to use my plot points
>Two sessions in, he targets my character with a boss that was way over our level and kills him
>Boss runs away after killing my character
That guy was a fucking faggot.

I'm in the same camp, not because of pragmatism, but out of laziness. It's easier and more fun, in my opinion, to keep backgrounds simple and point-form and to fill in the blanks as you play and get a feel for the character and determine where you want to take things. Feels more organic.

Let's get one thing straight. Your character only lasted 5 sessions because we weren't able to catch you cheating until then. The entire party wanted you dead from day 1, and if you hadn't shaped up by next week you were getting thrown out of my house anyway.

Next time leave your stupid fae catboi archer Mary Sue bullshit out of CoC.

Uh oh, somebody caught you on Veeky Forums!

Interesting. Tell us more, user.

Like people actually play with other people on Veeky Forums

>fae catboi archer Mary Sue
Clearly OP was putting in overtime hours at the faggot parade

>That guy was a fucking faggot.
Similar situation happened to me. We were level 10 and the boss level 17. The GM vastly underestimated how strong I was for a level 10 character.

He did it with us at level one and a level 10 boss. By level 10, I might have been able to beat a level 17 boss with my party, but not at level 1.

And you are on Veeky Forums... why?

that's a pretty strong claim there, user. could you elaborate before things descend into shitposting?

dude you can't leave us hanging like this

>5 sessions

You casual, try losing a character after 5 months, or 5 years.

Yeah but then they have a story, you know? They've done stuff.

Losing someone a quarter through your first campaign's just anticlimactic. It's worse if they're tied into the plot directly, because your replacement character will feel like just that- a replacement.

or something i don't know, forever gm

Having a character come into a game after the beginning just feels weird. Like you're never at the same status as the other player characters.

To be fair, Clinical Depression Man was a terrible superhero concept.

I'm trying to make sure my players attach themselves to NPCs somehow. That way, the player can just take over an NPC of their choice.

This is where making your players write in family members can really help.

oh noes! how unfair, your character should be guaranteed to survive to the end!

I'd play it.. Make him a psychic Eeyore-like dude who can project his misery into people and drain them of the will to do anything.

Would be fun in a silly game.

I bet you didn't even cry when Boromir sacrificed himself.

OP isn't complaining, he's lamenting. If you don't care what happens to your characters, why play them?

I like using that approach when I'm DMing.

However, I keep getting players that just want to jump in like it's Pathfinder Society or something and not a campaign we've been putting together and planning for half a year now. I guess that's what I get for having my players do the recruiting. Oh well. Should just get up off my ass and recruit.

Fuck you Jake. Your Captain Quark rip-off is shit.

I'll pour some 40 for your OC

Hey bro, at least mine fit the lighthearted setting.

Well he said fey cat boy so it's probably bullshit. I mean how many of those could there really be out there that get approved by GMs?

In a Pathfinder setting, yes.

Not in CoC. That's the DM'S problem for being a passive aggressive shithead.

Wholly fake.

I was wondering, do you reckon you could make a game out of that?
Like instead of getting levels, characters get details as they progress.
So a character starts off with nothing but a vague role (rifleman, heavy-weapons guy) and then gets shit like a first name, family, life experiences, and even the coveted and mythical "surname", with increasing plot armour to match

You could theme it after the obvious trek Redshirts, but if you want a fantasy flavour, The City Watch could work as an alternate setting

That's what you get for putting all that work in outside the sessions.

Backstory is great, but the important part is what happens during sessions. Actions speak louder than words and all that.

Backstory is really only useful as a way of nailing down the characters opinions and motivations in order to be able to play it consistently, and not like some vidya character who only picks the smart dialogue option every time.

Backstory that's some kind of YA novel about how awesome/brooding and tormented you are is really just a nuisance.

>do you reckon you could make a game out of that?
it's a cliche (that I haven't seen in years because of its stigma as a cliche), but that's how amnesiac characters can end up

of course, making a character with amnesia opens you up to all kinds of DM abuse in its own right

That could be a pretty fun beer and pretzels game.

Nanomachines?!

Damn it.
My money was on some form of undeath.

DEATH IS ONLY THE BEGINNING
YOUR NEXT ONE IS THIS ONE, BUT UNDEAD
and with Ghola-like amnesia

My favorite character was a fighter-variant in MERPS/Rolemaster. The very sesssion after he passed trials to get accepted by the Riders of Rohan, he was incinerated by a random encoutner'd demon. That was 20 years ago.

You'll never recover, user, enjoy. :^)

>The group was confused but somehow never questioned how he'd die and showup just fine the next morning
sounds like damn fine roleplaying coming from your fellow players - respect!

There is game like that it's called EPICS. Characters start with just short descriptions. As you play you add details about your character depending on what happens around, create flashbacks and small tie-ins getting literal Plot Armor for that.

HP of a character depends on how good player can tie them with the story.

That system is made to play action and superhero games. It's simple and free.

>dude you can't leave us hanging like this
>being that gullible
welcome to Veeky Forums

>Backstory that's some kind of YA novel about how awesome/brooding and tormented you are is really just a nuisance.
as long as it doesnt effect play negatively it has my approval. if players have those creative juices and urge to write out an elaborate backstory, that's great. as a GM, i need an executive summary, however.

Sorry, fell asleep soon after posting. Time to explain.

It was an Interwar pre-GD set game and spoopy shit was going down at the local college. Party was one security guard who used to be a cop before he got shot in the back, a PI, and two college students, one guy and one girl.

Truth be told I was expecting the guy playing the flirty blonde education major to be the problem, but nope. Turns out the other guy, despite being captain of the rugby team, was secretly a total chuuni. Kept freaking out whenever a cat showed up, which I used to keep him on the rails for most of the first session.

Then the absurd rolls started.
(cont.)

Now, to be fair, I don't instantly assume cheating when someone rolls hot (an old 3.5 DM rolled three 20s in a row for a missing PC's attack to salsify a miniboss, then did the same thing next week with my dice) but this guy was rolling sub 20 on everything. Eventually after dodging a trap and seeing a cat "smirking serenely at the carnage before you" he tells the cat to bite him, rolls a 00-0 and before I can say "wait I didn't say roll" the fucker pulls out some anime blue haired cat archer thing and says, I shit you not, "my character looks like this ny~ow."

For the next 3 sessions the party refused to RP with him and just used the fucker as a weapon, because he never fucking missed. and I kept looking at his dice, nothing seemed wrong.

The fifth session I spotted him palming the dice after another 00-0. Told him to empty his pockets, and took me 5 seconds to feel that the dice he was using were weighted.

Fuck you Casey. Hope you never get into a game ever again, because no one deserves to suffer that.

Every good book has characters die, like every campaign does. Introducing new character goes bad if it isn't done properly

10/10. Banhammer

>It's extra sad because it was the most work I've ever put into a background and story arc for a character and he only lasted like five sessions.
I was there about half a year back. I created a country, a culture, a religion and several noble families for my character's backstory and then he died two sessions in.

...

>Doing world building for your fucking character
You have no one to blame but yourself, unless you were also giving the GM much more head than the other players.

5 sessions is a lifetime in WFRP, your character lived a good life.

Proofs?

That feels like one of my campaigns

A tip for you newfriend. People claiming to know the OP are always lying, especially if the OP acts as if they know them.

>dying

Your character should die when you're voluntarily ready. Really, just have the players reach near-death when battle takes them out.
Or, take their stuff. Players hate that more than losing a character.

Try half way through their first session like what happened to one of my friends. It wasn't the DM's fault, the dice just really hated him

WH40K you dumb nerd next time try a real game

>Really, just have the players reach near-death when battle takes them out.
I ran a game that does this. A player ran out of the room to weep and sulk because his PC got KO'd and acquired a cosmetic injury.


If your players are going to be complete bitches about having bad things happen to their PCs, then I don't know why they are even playing games where that is a possibility. Perhaps they should go play some video-game where they can save-scum until they get the outcome they want.

The GM encouraged it and used pretty much all I gave him in some form or another.

Man losing a character? That sucks. But one game I lost a friend.


We played a themed game that started off with everyone being commoners, and slowly getting partial levels in adventuring classes, along with some minor unique perks. Part of the theme is that we're all kobolds, and had 10 point buy.

Being the crazy bastard I am, I played an elderly character with barely enough strength to walk and like 2 HP, but wisdom, charisma, and int out the ass.

I've gotten pretty much shit all for unique perks because I'm useless, but I got one boon from the DM; the ability to speak with one type of animals (subterranean). Yeah yeah, not a real subtype, lot's of off the cuff stuff in this game.


Anyway.

>Party is escaping some deep tunnels where we were doing some heroic shit but got trapped by a cave in.
>Managed to find an alternate route out but we're all beat up and suspect shenanigans from the DM before escaping.
>Encounter giant (size large) mole blocking out way out, party debates killing it for food/exp.
>Me: I tame it!
>DM: You can't just tame some wild animal that you can't even communicate with.
>Me: Sure I can I just talk to it and make it a deal to help us.
>DM: . . . fine, but you better get a good roll on handle animal.
>Me: *rolls nat 20*
>DM doesn't want to let it go that easily so I have to use diplomacy too. RNJesus is with me and I roll a 19 or some nonsense for a fantastic check.
>Molebro agrees to help us out for food
>Ride molebro from here on out since I'm too shit to even walk myself.
>Big surprise DM ambushes us with a fuck load of goblins. Everyone's freaking out, party members dropping like flies.
>Never fear though, Molebro is here! DM has made the mistake of stating giant moles as CR 3s. Tries to say Molebro is scared to fight, but the power of friendship and nat 20s are on my side.
>Crush the shit out of a half dozen goblins and Molebro hauls unconscious party-members to victory and fresh air.

>Fast forward like, 12+ sessions

>Molebro was nerfed initially but has become my animal companion now that I'm a druid and is quite the badass. Via wild cohort now he has a friend catbro. I'm basically fucking Dr Doolittle.
>I still have like 10 hp.

>This fairy knight asshole styled BBEG (I still have no clue what his actual stats were) has been fucking with us for some time, and we get into a showdown with him.
>I can't really remember how it happened except that we clearly fucked up and are fighting this asshole with a flying mount in a pile of web and grease.
>Catbro is swallowed whole by a giant frog thing and is fighting to escape.
>I'm on molebro in a big as pile of shit unable to move.
>Make eye contact with the BBEG. Look at my HP total. *gulp*.
>BBEG charges me and attacks.
>He's not aiming for me though, he's aiming for molebro.
>Nat. 20. On a lance charge. Confirmed. He deals somewhere around 50 damage to my already somewhat injured buddy.
>Molebro dies under me, sending me crashing to the ground.
>My character leaps to his feet in a rage and swings wildly at the BBEG. Of course I have -2 to hit and it doesn't do shit.
>Fairy asshole stabs me in the chest killing me instantly.


>You might think that's the end of my character, but nope. There's an NPC following us around with that medic heal skill based revive who manages to get me back to life next turn, and our super-archer manages to swing the fight for us.
>I lived but the DM destroyed everything I loved.
>Thus began my change in class and alignment towards chaotic evil.

I know the feel, mang.
I had a long running habit of being the munchkin of the group. Found a new group, with a new GM, and decided to fully role play that shit.
>Gets killed in the first session.
>I see how it's going to be.
>Comes back with thoroughly minmaxed divine metamagic cleric
>I'm not proud of any of this.