I like the historical focus. But I wouldn’t categorize this as “doom” or “tragic” (in the greco-roman sense) though it is certainly emotional and heartwrenching. To me, doom or tradgedy implies the absence of meaning, or a death without purpose. Dying for a noble cause – to save innocent lives – is heroism. Reminiscent of Sophie Scholl. I look forward to to seeing this game.
Playing Doomed Characters
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Just dropping in to mention Our Last Best Hope. The PCs are a team of specialists trying to stop a world-ending threat, probably at the cost of all their lives. They set up the collaboratively generated threats they will face. Our Last Best Hope operates in that heroic sacrifice space, where the characters are doomed but maybe isn’t quite as bleak as some of the other games mentioned above.
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Pretty much every character I ever play is doomed, hehe. Go with what you know they say! 
A bunch of of played The King is Dead the other day - I don’t know if everyone is doomed in every play through; but it was all pretty doomy. It also lets you sprinkle on extra doom at the end if you have the right cards. DOOOOOOOM.
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Oooh. Before the Storm is pretty DOOOMED too.
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That’s a good distinction, thanks for making it. In the game there can be tragedy along the way, but ultimately it is about heroism.
Thanks!
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I was just coming back to mention Before the Storm by Joanna Piancastelli.
This is a great game about the conversations and flashbacks of a fantasy adventuring party the night before the BIG BATTLE which will result in the deaths of some of them.
I played a great game a couple of years ago laden with pathos when all the players stacked our hands to ensure that one of our number - the reluctant hero that the people needed - would survive. The player who played that reluctant hero didn’t really realise quite what was going to happen and as character after character narrated how we died in the battle to ensure she survived we all felt a bit tearful (in a good way).
Joanna converted it into a LARP called Dawnstone I think which was similarly amazing.
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Heh, I was coming on to remind everyone that The Skeletons is my favorite game about doomed characters. It is sort of a thing with you, Jason.
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3:16 is an interesting example of a game where the individual sessions are not about doomed characters at all, but it turns out that the long-view campaign structure and endgame are.
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That was the game at a housecon last year that I was MOST disappointed to have missed. It sounded absolutely fantastic.
Interestingly, one of the gamers had typically avoided that kind of game, but ended up being absolutely fantastic in it.
I haven’t played it, but carry is set up so that everyone in the platoon dies or has some horrible experience by the end.
Before the Storm is good 
Nemesis 382 (in the same book, Seven Wonders ) doesn’t have to end with doom but…your mission goal is to enter a black hole, so…
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Oh, yeah, carry is very much about doomed characters. It’s legitimately harrowing.
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I played a game of Nemesis 382 last year and it… wasn’t great. The problem was that the anticipated style of the game wasn’t made crystal clear up front. I was expecting an “Event Horizon” style descent into madness, another player was clearly seeing it More like Disneys “Black Hole” with problems to overcome, and a third player was keen on seeing the inherent humour in a situation with being a funny alien. I know that I’d check up front in future what kind of game something is intended to be!
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there is a recurring theme in the games of Fiasco I’ve played in that i’ve yet to have a character live to the end of the game. I think character death and “the end” of a character is a narrative tool but what i dislike is “meaningless deaths” but then, i dont play many gritty games where that can occur often.
I think giving characters options on what they choose to have their characters die for or how their characters die is something i’d encourage in narrative games and indeed, it’s something i’ve encouraged in larps that i’ve ran, (one character did a stupidly courageous thing knowing he would die slowly in X sessions as a result) and this proved to be an excellent motivator for the character to get out and be more proactive in engaging the game and the world (in this case, the character wanted to make a difference before he passed)
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Have you seen “Our Last Best Hope”? The death cards in that seem to play exactly towards the kind of trope which you like 
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There’s the Doomed playbook in Masks. I feel that the Doom is most prevalent in 1) a long-term game or 2) a short-term game in which the character’s Doom Track is significantly advanced
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Characters in Dialect are not necessarily doomed, but in our games they usually end up this way, and the fact that the Isolation is, indeed, doomed creates GREAT moments. One of my best role play experiences was when, during our first session of Dialect, in age two or three, my character (the leader) was telling the others that our gang will surely survive (we played with Thieves Cant backdrop).
So, I’m explaining that we will surely survive all this, and the player who played the Oracle archetype just looks at me. I look at her. She gives me the slightest of nods and I had no doubt that it said “I know that you know that you’re bullshiting them, and I approve of it, cause there’s nothing that we can do now.”
There’s no way it would have played that way if we as players didn’t know that our group won’t survive.
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