2. Use Fate/Hero points so that in the end, it’s really the player’s choice whether that character dies in that kind of incident.

Applying the same standard – no forgiveness for GMs or players on a missed modifier – results in wildly different outcomes for GMs and players.

I don’t see how prior impact plays into it — what I’m thinking of is time, effort and emotion already invested in the character, and cutting off the potential for future investment. In other words: players get attached to their characters (ideally, at least), and loss of a PC due to a random mistake can be a big deal.

2: Ending a campaign destroys not only the DM’s entire onvestment but ALSO the investment of all the players.

Good point! No disagreement that the order of magnitude is different. I stand by the fact that each element (campaign, PC) represents that maximum investment for that person (GM, player), even recognizing that the player’s investment is smaller, and that that’s an important consideration for this discussion.

I see where you’re coming from on both points, I just don’t agree with everty aspect of either of them.

It also depends on the magnitude of the mistake. If you were just a little off on your hit point count, I might still rule you dead, because the NPC would probably have managed to hit you again (this assumes the NPC survived at least a few rounds while you were thought dead). Of course if it’s not too vengefull an NPC, it might be possible to retcon the death to a feigned death, and now the NPC has lost his chance to actually kill you.

Frank

One of my first moments of GMing was running a DND one shot with a friend. It was all great, everything was going beautifully, the game was fun, we enjoyed ourselves, and then the villain killed him. Being of the school of thought that players die, it ended the game. I hadn’t balanced out the encounter enough, and it just sucked to think oh, well that’s the game. Now I tend to be of the opinion that the player(s) is(are) the spotlight of the game, I’m getting my enjoyment by structuring a game/story with known monkeywrenches, and lets make sure its fun. I kind of think of it like a TV show or a movie. The BDH (Big Darn Heroes) are always going to come out decently, unless the plot takes a major turn for the worse, and then it should feel dramatic, not random because a roll went wrong, or a modifier got left out.

BUT…

Death isn’t that much fun, I would take the PC aside and ask whether they would like to carry on with their character and if so stretch my GM power to explain how the character apparently died before all the other players but is in actual fact alive.

My favourite tactic is the rescue mission, the character is held captive and the other PCs have to rescue the character. If the character in question wants to play; well, some careless guard can leave the door open or something equally deus ex machina >=0)
I have also used things like ‘spirits trapped on a plane of existence’, ‘buried alive’ (funny to see PCs faces when they realise they just buried a comrade but every NPC thinks that they can’t grieve properly and refuse to exhume)etc.
To summarise IMHO, PC deaths should be the potential start of new stories not the end of old ones… unles the PC is bored and wants to try a new character.

My player rolled a great Intimidate check against a Dire Weasel and it ran and hid. By the rules a Dire Weasel isn’t smart enough to be intimidated but I only looked this up after for confirmation of a sneaking suspicion that it was a bad call.

I didn’t retcon anything, just gave my players a “heads up” that it may not actually work next time.

If the situation had been reversed I’d definitely have overturned the call. If I can possibly avoid it, the players shouldn’t have to pay for my mistakes.

There’s also all sorts of ways to apply this to NPCs as well. Intelligent NPCs could stay slumped down (now that no one is paying attention), act dead, and slink away while the party is otherwise occupied. Non-intelligent beings would probably act as per their intelligence and temperment would dictate.

Otherwise resurrect him “behind the curtain” by some NPC and let him rejoin the party under the Player’s control.

What I suspect you were getting at is the fact that comparing most PCs to most campaigns, there’s a huuuuuge gulf in time invested between the two — because while the player and GM both spend the same amount of time at the table, the player doesn’t spend any time outside the game working on the campaign, and the GM does.

That’s exactly what I’m getting at. I’m talking about order of magnitude, not amount of contribution. Also keep in mind:

1: Removing a character in NO WAY completely eliminates a player’s entire investment. Their prior impact on the game world is still intact (unless they got hit so hard they never existed, perhaps by a wish or a diety-level opponent).

2: Ending a campaign destroys not only the DM’s entire onvestment but ALSO the investment of all the players.

Thus, not only are they not the same order of magnitude in terms of time spent, they’re also not even the same order of magnitude percent wise, as the death of a character destroys a PORTION of their investment, whereas the death of a campaign destroys ALL of the investment of the DM and all of the investment of all players.