I need help on Sial's help...


Curse of the Crimson Throne

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Hello there,
My group ran the Acropolis of the thrallkeepers during the last game session and they played it pretty badly. they let the wizzard alone on the lower level with 2 red mantis assassins. It happended what should have happened. They found the wiz'body 5 rounds later. So they are now thinking about going back to Kaer maga and visit the temple of Pharasma (one player is a cleric of this god) to get it back alive. They also asked help to the new friend , the shadow count Sial. This one cannot cast resurection yet but he is able call a plannar ally who could - an efreet. my main question is: do you think he will do it ? and at what price ? will the efreet agreed ? and at what price ?

what would you do in this situation ?


Quote:
they let the wizzard

Was his name Rincewind?

Quote:
This one cannot cast resurection yet

He can cast Raise Dead. Why not just wait a day for him to prepare it?

Dark Archive

rincewind would have run out first ;)
the 2 negative level are too expensive. anyway is a cleric with death in his domains will cast a raise dead ?


He doesn't have to heal the negative levels at that time, the party can keep their live friend along until they can afford to get them healed.

And nothing stops a Death cleric from casting Raise Dead, it's not like they're opposed schools like wizards have to deal with.


Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

My group handles death a little differently than the rulebook suggests, but I think it can apply to your situation.

Penalties for death seem to get in the way of a good time, so we generally hand-wave resurrection into the story somehow. Since we are usually close to WBL anyway, there is no penalty for rerolling--thus, in our minds, there should be little to no penalty for not rerolling. Most of the time, we like trying new character concepts so resurrection is rarely in the cards (unless we need a few more levels to realize the concept we are currently playing towards).

Anyway, in your case I say that Sial should pull off whatever favors he needs to and resurrect the wizard, who's player clearly doesn't want to reroll. It puts the party, and that character in particular, in Sial's debt, which will make them more amenable to working with him when it is time to breach Scarwall. And since Sial is kind of a jerk in my opinion, I would probably make sure he mentions the favor all of the time to the point of annoyance. Sial needs these heroes to realize his ultimate goal of acquiring the fangs of Kazavon, so he will give the wizard the gift of life. Sial is also a bad man, so he will use that favor as leverage against the party.

Obviously, if you or your group are sticklers for the death rules, this might come across as cheesy, but Sial has the capacity to make resurrection happen and a reason to keep the wizard around, so it isn't so bad.

Just make it fun!


Knick wrote:
Anyway, in your case I say that Sial should pull off whatever favors he needs to and resurrect the wizard, who's player clearly doesn't want to reroll. It puts the party, and that character in particular, in Sial's debt, which will make them more amenable to working with him when it is time to breach Scarwall. And since Sial is kind of a jerk in my opinion, I would probably make sure he mentions the favor all of the time to the point of annoyance. Sial needs these heroes to realize his ultimate goal of acquiring the fangs of Kazavon, so he will give the wizard the gift of life. Sial is also a bad man, so he will use that favor as leverage against the party.

Knick is absolutely right, if one of your PCs owes a debt to an NPC like Sial, it can add all kinds of flavor to the game.


Keep in mind, Pathfinder changed Negative Levels. You can have the negative levels restored through Restoration (cost 1,000 gp in diamond dust as opposed to the usual 100 gp) and Greater Restoration (5,000 gp diamond dust). Restoration can restore 1 negative level per week, and as the players are trudging around the Cinderlands, they should have enough time to get both levels restored.

Negative levels also don't have the same effect as in previous additions. For instance, the Wizard doesn't actually loose any of his spells, just variables dependent on his caster level. For instance, if you are a 5th level Wizard with fireball, and you gain a negative level (Such as from Enervation or death), you lose 1 effective caster level, but don't lose your spells or spell slots. This means that you would have a Caster level of 4th, but still be able to cast 3rd level spells, so a Fireball from you would deal 4d6 points of damage, instead of 5d6.

The Wizard's spells may be a little weaker for a short time, but after a week and two Restoration spells, he'll be fine.

It's worth noting that, if you have the time to wait, Raise Dead + 2 Restorations is the cheaper method of bringing people back to life as it only costs 7,000 gp, as opposed to the 11,000 gp for Resurrection and Restoration o2 25,000 gp for True Resurrection.

Also, it's up to you, but Sial could, technically, use Planar Ally to call a Akhana Aeon to use it's Raise Dead SLA and Restoration to raise the wizard and restore one of his levels. There is nothing, truly, stopping a LE cleric from using Planar Ally on a N outsider other than GM say-so.


And that neutral outsider actually working for Zon-Kuthon or wanting to help a cleric of Zon-Kuthon.

Planar Ally isn't "I automatically get the outsider I want," it's "I ask the GM to give me an outsider ally and he picks what I get. I can make a specific request, but he has no obligation to go with it." The "GM say-so" is actually written into the spell.

I'd handwave Sial having the components on hand to raise and restore people, myself. Assuming the wizard is willing to take a raise from a lawful evil cleric of Zon-Kuthon (since he gets to learn the caster's alignment and patron, though it's not like Sial's subtle about it), it's still a huge favor that the party will owe Sial.

I'd have Sial pay for the expenses out of his own pocket, but advise the party he'll be needing their help with a later project that he thinks they'll be interested in *knowing smirk*, and wishing them luck with the Shoanti.

It does amuse me that the party is jumping through a bunch of hoops to learn from the Shoanti information that Sial already knows.

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