The fear of death in D&D

There are countless debates, written, spoken, or even imagined, on character death in D&D. Extreme views have been posted over the game system's forty-something years of existence, from death being hailed as the ultimate punishment over a player's laziness, foolishness, or plain dumb luck to being considered a taboo amongst game tables, never to be touched upon. David has made two excellent posts discussing the disrupting effects such an occasion can have on the game's story and posing alternative suggestions. But what does it mean to face death in D&D? As my mind always extends into two sides, I want to explore this question from the perspective of the game system's two fundamental play styles: old-school and modern.

In old school gaming, the fear of death comes off as natural, because a multitude things are, naturally, deadly (fire, poison, overwhelming monsters, pits, traps designed to actually discourage people from breaking into) - characters are fragile even at mid levels, and combat, being a brutal and unpredictable affair it normally is, leads to a high rate of lethality, but players embrace death in the end and seem to take it lightly. This can turn into two ways: either the player who enjoys their character is afraid to throw them into risky situations and often attempts to avoid them, or they know they will die eventually and go reckless. These in turn can make or break the game, depending on each campaign's style. In the basic editions of the game, it is often stressed that combat is usually the least favourite option and mechanically this is shown by creatures awarding a trivial amount of XP for being defeated - it is much more convenient and rewarding to bypass them and loot their treasure than confront them. As the campaign is loosely, or not at all, tied to the characters played, one's demise doesn't affect the adventure much - perhaps halt the game while the player rolls a new character.

Using an example from my own experience, in my B/X campaign, which has so far lasted a few months, I've had eleven deaths over sixteen sessions, two TPKs and five separate kills.

In modern gaming, a marginal portion of hazards lead to instant death, if at all, and players are not accustomed to sudden and shocking situations of such an incident so it has a heavier impact. Players invest on their character from its very beginning, with plenty of customisation options and the overall sense that this character is a hero, a cut above the normal folk (hence, the 4d6-drop-lowest roll for ability scores being the default mode). While 2e and 3e toyed with the idea of whether characters are common rabble or heroes, 4e cemented the idea and even used the term heroic tier for levels 1-10. 5e has three tiers of play, with the first being dubbed local heroes (DMG pg. 37): even 1st-level characters are heroes. In comparison, characters in older editions gained the title hero when they reached 4th level, which implied that up to that point, they weren't considered any particular individuals (except perhaps for the occasional dungeon delving and saving kidnapped people or stolen items from the clutches of evil).

Above all, character death isn't acknowledged as part of the game, and this is especially shown in latest editions (some google search reveals plenty of articles and posts that paint the notion of character death as something bad). While this may differ upon each play-style, mechanically speaking, it is quite difficult for a character death to occur, especially beyond 3rd level. So when the possibility of death is presented, players are dreaded even more than their old-school counterparts. Story-heavy campaigns abhor character death, as it strips them from furthering the plot (you need to be an expert DM to tackle such an issue) and if one occurs during the game, it is viewed as a special moment.

Contrary to my B/X campaign's death rate, in my Planescape 5e campaign, which spanned about two years, I've only had one death, and the character was resurrected soon after.