UnofficialWIKI
Builder
Edit / Suggest changeSuggest deletion

Death Rules

death

Sets whether death is permanent, how the narrator plays a character's return from death, and how the story ends when the whole party dies.

In the editor

"What happens when characters die"

Editor location
Files → Mechanics → Death Rules
Editor type
Edit in Studio + View JSON
API endpoint
/sections/death.json/sections/death.md
Size limits
  • death.instructions — 4,000
Related

Schema

json
{
  "death": {
    "permadeath": "boolean",
    "instructions": "string"
  }
}

Example

json
{
  "death": {
    "permadeath": false,
    "instructions": "Narrate the character's return from death as a scene with a price: they come back changed, missing a memory, marked by a scar, or owing something to whatever returned them. They keep their possessions and can continue the adventure."
  }
}

Note: death.instructions is the narrator's guidance for a character returning from death, and applies when permadeath is false. A world created in Studio starts with instructions to narrate a knockout instead of a death: the character wakes healed the next day in a nearby city with their party, memories and every item intact. The engine's base world, which fills the field when a world leaves it out, asks for a dramatic return that carries a cost but lets the character continue.

Fields

permadeath

Determines whether the "continue" option remains when a character dies. When true, death is permanent and the game ends once every party member has died. When false, a character who dies can return, narrated according to instructions. The default is false.

instructions

How the narrator plays a character's return from death. A world created in Studio starts with a knockout in place of death: the character wakes healed the next day in a nearby city with their party, keeping their memories and every item. The engine's base world, used when a world leaves the field out, asks for a dramatic return in which the character keeps their memories and most possessions, loses or changes something, and carries on. With permadeath on, where nobody returns, it guides the party's final ending instead. Studio labels it Resurrection instructions.