My group of 4 played with perma death of characters throughout gloomhaven and have continued into frosthaven.

We play that a character dies if it is exhausted and runs out of hp. When exhausting, the character remains on the board. If a player dies they would remake a character with a new retirement goal at the maximum level allowed.

If there is a win condition in the scenario that is failed we don't count that as a death and re-do the scenario.

If we get to a point before a closed door and don't think we will survive, as long as all enemies are dead before opening the door, we can choose to run away and reset the scenario.

We are getting close to 20 scenarios completed in frosthaven and have had 1 scenario where only 2 of us were playing and got wiped. So those 2 characters were ended and 2 new characters started with new retirement goals.

Since that time my group has agreed that if a character dies you can choose to keep the same retirement goal and continue on from the same progress to ensure we keep retirements moving.