Character Development: Death

Any character who has more than 0 Death Points is dead. There are a number of ways that a dead character (player or non-player) can remain in the game, and/or return to the game. These are with fate points, as ghosts, or through the natural progression of time in comic books. You can also put statues up in the town hall, but statues don’t usually have many adventures. Your mileage may vary.

Spontaneous Combustion: When someone with physical powers dies, there’s a chance that those powers will manifest themselves uncontrollably for a short period of time. Roll d100 for each power; if this is less than or equal to the PR for the power, the power manifests itself at a Q equal to the amount the d100 roll was below the PR, plus one. Assume the body has as many EP as its original Maximum Body DP, and the power runs until this EP runs out.

Fate Points: As described in the section about Fate Points, a Fate Point can reduce the character’s Death Points to Permanent Injuries.

Ghosts: If a character dies while traveling astrally, the character might become a ghost. The player must make a saving throw vs. Willpower. If successful, the character remains in this world as a spirit. If unsuccessful, the character still remains, but as a haunt: the character is stunned by the death, and confused. They will remain confused, haunting the place of their death (or some other place of high emotional value) until someone convinces them that they’ve died. Then they go to the aprés-vie party appropriate for their religion.

Characters who are sleeping when they die might be astral. The chance is 1 in 100 (1 in 10 for wizards or psychics). In this case, however, the saving throw for confusion is vs. half willpower.

At the moment of death, a conscious character can try to remain on this plane (or try to refuse to die). The player must save vs. Newoen-19; if successful, the character is treated as if astral while dreaming. A save vs. willpower must be made to see if the ghost is confused or not.

In some cases, the character’s death deity may come for the ghost, whether confused or not. Check up on the mythology of the character’s religion/nationality.