Dying to Accomplish Something

Gaming is an interesting way of exploring something that's not intuitive. In this case, the necessity of death in drama.

Years ago, the style in gaming was more comparable to a videogame. You'd kick down the door, slay whatever non-human evil was inside, and loot the magical treasure trove it was inevitably guarding. This style of gaming is falling out of favor because computers can run quicker combats, generate more interesting treasure, and have better graphics (any).

It was in the high-combat era of gaming that you could expect a character death per story, or even multiple deaths per session. Your new shiny elven wizard would saunter around a corner, step on a trap of horrible instant squishing, and you'd generate a new character as quickly as possible so as to not miss the rest of the adventure.

There wasn't much point in having a backstory or character development, as your character was more likely to end up horribly exploded than happily ever after.

More recent games try to avoid the sting of death. It's minimized with either outright avoidance or an abundance of resurrection. Death is more like time-out than dead.

I am a proponent of low death or no death gaming. In a real story, you can ensure that no character dies just because Mook #23 shot his gun extra well that day. In gaming, a character can die long before they meet the man who killed their father, save the princess, or indeed even leave the farm.

Yet games where the threat of real, non-revocable character death looms feel more thrilling, more accomplishing. The compromise is best achieved by the person running the game - it's the job of the Storyteller to warn about dangers, clarify threats, and sometimes even nudge dice a little. But it's also the job of the Storyteller not to make consequences unreal.

We've all seen what happens when a story has characters hopping back-and-forth from the grave like they're cat's not sure if they want outside or in. It just goes to prove that it's better to let a character die than to let drama itself die.