Player Processing Character Death Goes Through All Five Stages Of Grief In Real Time At Table

A tabletop RPG player whose barbarian character was killed by a red dragon during last Saturday's session progressed through all five stages of grief in real time at the gaming table, completing the full Kubler-Ross model in approximately thirty-seven minutes while his four fellow players waited to continue the encounter. The character, Thokk the Unyielding, a half-orc barbarian with a carefully developed three-page backstory involving a stolen birthright and a vow of vengeance, charged a CR 17 red dragon with seven hit points remaining. The dragon's fire breath dealt fifty-six damage. Thokk did not yield. Thokk ceased to exist. Stage one, denial, lasted approximately four minutes. "That can't be right," said player Kevin Rollplay. "I had Relentless Endurance. Wait, I used that last round. But I had a health potion. Wait, I drank that. Can I retroactively not have charged the dragon?" Stage two, anger, lasted eight minutes and was directed primarily at the DM. "You put a CR 17 dragon in a level 9 campaign? That's adversarial DMing. That's a TPK waiting to happen. I charged it because I thought it was an illusion." The DM noted that she had described the dragon as "very real and very large" three times before the charge. Kevin disputed this recollection. Stage three, bargaining, occupied twelve minutes. Kevin proposed that Thokk's rage might have provided fire resistance (it doesn't), that a nearby NPC might have a resurrection scroll (there was no nearby NPC), and that the dragon might have chosen to knock Thokk unconscious instead of killing him (the fire breath dealt five times his remaining hit points). Stage four, depression, was the briefest at three minutes, during which Kevin stared at his character sheet in silence while the other players exchanged glances. Stage five, acceptance, arrived at minute thirty-seven. "He died doing what he loved," Kevin said quietly. "Charging things." Kevin has already begun building a new character. It is also a barbarian. It is named Thokk II.