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A subject that I feel hasn't really been covered in the rules is what exactly can cause a character to wake up from sleep in D&D. (Other than loud noise or rigorous motion)
For example :
what type of rolls would you give to someone trying to wake up if they are simply being touched?
What if someone is being level-drained while sleeping?
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Anything that causes pain should probably wake a character up. If it is enough to cause damage I would say the character waskes up.
For sounds I think it should require some kind of roll. Perhaps a listen check against a DC proportionate to the volume of the sound. I would penalize the check a bit because sleeping people are not ACTIVELY listening.
Are level drains painful?
Say it's coming from a vampire?
Anything that causes pain should probably wake a character up. If it is enough to cause damage I would say the character waskes up.
For sounds I think it should require some kind of roll. Perhaps a listen check against a DC proportionate to the volume of the sound. I would penalize the check a bit because sleeping people are not ACTIVELY listening.
Are level drains painful?
Say it's coming from a vampire?
While level drains might not be painful exactly, a DM could rule that having one's life force stolen away would produce some manner of sensation. That seems reasonable.
There's some rule from some OGL source that states that Listen checks take a -10 penalty when PCs are asleep. It also takes a full-round action to wake up. This source even had a feat called Light Sleeper, which negated the Listen penalty and made waking up a move equivalent action.
I think that damage would wake somebody up unless they had some flaw like heavy sleeper. Being touched wouldn't wake a normal person up, but being fiercely shaken would.
A standard rule that we use is that if something is happening where the player wants their character to wake up (whether it's someone making off with the horses, strange noise, or simply another PC trying to wake them up because it's time to break camp), they do a CON check. If they make their check, they wake up alert. A 1 means they're dead to the world and NOTHING wakes them up that round.
I'd say that touching should wake a character up if the player wants his PC to wake up. I've heard about war vets waking up because a family member tiptoed into their rooms at night; surely being touched would have the same effect.
As a side note, I often have problems adjucating what to do when a character DOESN'T want to wake up. I've had practical joker PCs torment spellcasting PCs who are trying to gain sufficient rest to recover their spells...a very amusing situation!
I'd say that touching should wake a character up if the player wants his PC to wake up. I've heard about war vets waking up because a family member tiptoed into their rooms at night; surely being touched would have the same effect.
As a side note, I often have problems adjucating what to do when a character DOESN'T want to wake up. I've had practical joker PCs torment spellcasting PCs who are trying to gain sufficient rest to recover their spells...a very amusing situation!
To be the contrarian theres plenty of folklore about creatures which specificly target sleeping people, Nightmares, Night hags, Vampires (there was even a vampire discipline in VtM called morpheus (sp) A sleeping visitation by a succubus/incubus could even be considered pleasurable.
The situation at handshould dictate the die roll IMO
Are level drains painful?
Say it's coming from a vampire?
Whether the level drain is painful or not (and I can only imagine that having part of your life energy forcibly separated from you would be generally unpleasant -- exceptions including most notably the succubus), the level drain of a Vampire is delivered by a Slam Attack. This, by definition, is an unpleasant sensation and most likely sufficient to wake up anyone other than the party dwarf. Dwarves are notoriously sound sleepers -- His snoring probably would drown out his cries of agony anyway.
I think my rule is that if someone deliberately tries to wake you up or you take damage, you automatically do so. Otherwise, count as if you rolled a 0 on a Listen check each round. If your enemies are sneaking you probably won't hear them, but if a battle takes place you'll almost certainly wake up.