Anime wizards and how they die: An introduction to Osiria's death mechanic
Hi, this a post about how death works in my game Osiria, which if you haven't heard of, is a a ttrpg about anime mages going on magical quests across the vast, titular ocean of Osiria. It's heavily inspired by anime shows like Fairy Tail and One Piece in its setting and tone, and it uses a simple, fast-paced dicepool system for everything, including a magic system offering players a lot of creative freedom. Going forward, I will be making more posts here explaining the mechanics, setting, and themes, but let's begin by talking about character death.
Osiria is not a game with hit points, injury tables or death saves, it's a game that only tries to emulate and build upon the drama and genre conventions of shounen battle anime. It does this both in it's damage mechanic and in it's death mechanic, which are of course linked pretty closely, but without dragging on about Wounds and Scars, here are the rules for death:
[Perseverance is a metacurrency that allows players to resist certain GM moves, and represents their willpower and determination, but I'll save the full explanation for a future post]
The Last Stand nicely allows for both the drama of anime wizards putting everything they got into one final climactic act, and allows the player of the character some creative freedom in not only how, but when this happens. Yes, this means they can take their final scar at any point in the session, but only activate their last stand near the end, this means they don't have to sit and watch their friends play for another hour, but also means they get to choose the most dramatic timing.
You may have also noticed, this "death" mechanic doesn't necessitate the character actually dying, which adds both room for players looking for a more lighthearted story and a possible return of the character in a later campaign, all while making sense for the genre (because honestly, when was the last time you saw a shounen protagonist die?)
