From time to time, in all RPGs I am familiar with (other than TFOS, but that’s another matter entirely), player-controlled characters will die due to some inherent game mechanic.

Why your character got capped

1. Sometimes the DM just gets tired of fudging rolls for you.
2. Sometimes you fight stuff you should run away from.
3. Sometimes the DM miscalculates your remaining HP and fudges inappropriately.
4. Dragons are tough.
5. Cthulhu was not made for huggin’.
6. Your wizard sucks and hit you with an AoE spell.
7. Your cleric was too busy doing your job for you to heal your sorry ass.
8. Rogues have no business involving themselves in toe-to-toe comba.t
9. You brought a non-magical weapon to fight a Demon? What did you expect?
10. Remember that legend about the curse of the King’s Crown Jewels? It was correct.

Ok, all kidding aside, there are a number of reasons that PC-fatalities are sometimes necessary, and occasionally beneficial for everybody

A Sense of Danger

What’s the challenge in sending four lvl10 adventurers against a handful of non-leveled Kolbalds? Opponents that are difficult to overcome (such as Sir Punching Dummy) can be quite boring.

Whether you are playing a game of courtly intrigue, or room-by-room hack & slash, or Cthuloid investigative work, there are three important elements to keep in play at all times: A purpose, and obstacle, and a threat.

• Purpose

  What are the characters doing? At any given moment, anybody involved in a D&D game should be able to give an answer that is somehow satisfactory to the character. It may be “I’m on the run from the Zhentarim, looking for a safe harbor” or “I’m questing to stop some weird evil cult” or “I’m following this dude that keeps killing stuff with lots of money; with any luck, he’ll make me rich.”

  Every player-controlled character should have a purpose that satisfies the answer to the question “why did you do that?” For lack of such a purpose, the character should act dissatisfied and seek one. Playing a dissatisfied character is dissatisfying in itself, so it should be avoided when possible.

• Obstacle

  If all you need to do to shut down the evil cult that is going to call down the mighty Ithaqua to destroy the Eastern Seaboard is to call the local constabulary, you haven’t got much of a game, do you?

  Obstacles need to require and exertion of some kind of effort on the part of the players. Some players like obstacles that can be dealt with by the edge of a sword, others like obstacles that can be overcome by some fast-talking or clever thinking. Either way, it shouldn’t be a given that the players will prevail.

• Threat

  Here’s where player-killing comes in. There needs to be a chance that the Obstacle will overcome the players. As they say at Despair, “before you attempt to beat the odds, be sure you can survive the odds beating you.”

  If the players are trying to outsmart an opponent, it is more interesting if that opponent has a modicum of intelligence. Moriarty was the best Sherlock Holmes villain because he was every bit as clever as Holmes. The intelligence and wisdom of the opponent may carry the day, so this puts pressure on the players to perform well

  Similarly, in combat there’s no fun in gunning down unarmed elderly people. At least, a campaign built upon shooting unarmed elderly people wouldn’t go anywhere in the long run. At least give the old coot a shotgun and a keen ear so he’ll notice you sneaking up on him. With a risk of injury and death, combat becomes more compelling. It’s all too easy to charge into combat fearlessly if you believe your DM won’t kill you.

New Beginnings

Retiring a compulsively adventuring character can be difficult to justify at times, and sometimes takes a heck of a lot of work. After 15 levels of brash, headstrong wanderlust, why should an adventurer suddenly spend his hard-earned fortune on a small inn in the middle of nowhere to tend bar for the rest of his days?

Killing a character off retires him the easy way. Easy for the DM at least. So long as the death seems meaningful and fair, players generally won’t have a problem with it. If you as a DM intend to drop five Great Wyrm Red Dragons on a party because you can’t be bothered with coming up with a good denouement, you’d better clear it with them first and make sure they get to enjoy their last pitched battle.

As with many important turning points in a character’s life (changing classes, getting a cohort, changing alignments, and especially death) it is a good thing to work out some of the details with the player ahead of time. This avoids hard feelings, and gives the player a chance to improve upon the DM’s idea. With any luck, you’ll get the character killed off in a way that the player’s will talk about years later.