A Little Less Lethal

[taichara]

You hear a lot sometimes about the (supposed) lethality of OSR and OSR-adjacent games, and how players are used to having backup PCs and so on and so forth; but you know, in my experience the toss-away-the-dollie mindset hasn’t really been how it’s worked. Folks get attached to their characters. This always disposable-PC, cavalier thing is one of the more annoying bits, for me, of the “OSR” construct.

Having your PC die kind of sucks a lot of the time. It’s true.

So, chewing on this while trying not to get completely soaked at work, I came up with some alternate options. Toss 2d6 when a PC measures their length in the dust, and let them carry on — but with a bit more baggage than what they started with.

Of course, some might decide they’d rather have their PC die dramatically, or heroically, or comedically, or they just don’t like the result of the roll. That’s also totally cool.


What did you walk away from death with?

02: Marked by the damned …
03: Came back with a spirit (dead or otherwise) sharing body
04: Woke bound with a geas to perform a certain task
05: Maimed wind; prone to illness
06: Missing or maimed limb
07: Shocking or strange-looking scar
08: Lost or partially-lost sense (whether injury or trauma)
09: Permanent wound (requires tending)
10: Woke bound with a geas on a certain behaviour
11: Appear like the dead; healing is twice as difficult now
12: Marked by the beatific …


Or, what if for some reason an adversary had the chance to kill the PC, but chose not to? Though there surely would be a reason for such a decision, right? Toss 1d12 and —

Why did they stay their hand?

01: Proving they could have dispatched you is good enough for them
02: “Wait! I remember you! You were at –” (were you though?)
03: They don’t want you to die; they want you to suffer …
04: A prisoner is worth more than a corpse
05: That hexmark they just placed on you will ensure you’re no threat anyway
06: “If I spare your life, will you help me with …”
07: You would have been their first sapient kill, and they just can’t …
08: “I’m not the real enemy! The real enemy is –“
09: It was less ‘staying their hand’ and more ‘didn’t check to be sure’, honestly
10: A strange faint glow appeared around you and they backed right off (but did it stay? what now?)
11: “Now I owe you nothing.” (have you even seen them before?)
12: A leader or companion orders them to let you live; they are not happy, but comply (for now) (and why were you spared?)