a Few quick questions to make sure I'm not screwing things up...
Alright, it is presumed that a cleric knows when a corpse was undead, but how? Detect Undead? Heal checks? Or do they just know their perfidious foe when they see them?
Alright, I've got a character, who's playing a Ghost in my Ghostwalk campaign, he's died and come back, died as a ghost and been ressurrected- as a ghost, meaning they took the gentle reposed ectoplasm and rez'd him as a ghost. However, as part of circumstance, his body has been...well placed elsewhere...so what if someone tries to ressurrect him, one of two things happen. He either agrees or disagrees to be raised.
I assume True Ressurection does the same, but you can do that WITHOUT a body, so he could do that and forgo the fact that his body was napped.
Anyway, thoughts, comments are appreciated, my questions are:
1. How does a Cleric know when an undead corpse is, well undead?
2. How is a Ghostwalk Ghost affected by the spell Scry?
3. How is a Ghostwalk Ghost affected by ressurection spells? This partly assumes the use of an actual body and not ectoplasm (I have a fair idea how that works and glossed over it in my campaign since the PC was by himself and was ghostly ressurected by NPCs, maybe you need Ghostwalk for this, so I'll just look that over again before I respond to replies. I don't have it handy at the moment or I probably wouldn't be asking this question.)
4. How does Sacrificing someone affect their soul? (as in what ways does it affect the soul, not how can it- Book of Vile Darkness) Is it destroyed or some other metaphysical predicament forced upon it/them? I know d&d doesn't so much do soul as spirit...
a Few quick questions to make sure I'm not screwing things up...
Alright, it is presumed that a cleric knows when a corpse was undead, but how? Detect Undead? Heal checks? Or do they just know their perfidious foe when they see them?
Alright, I've got a character, who's playing a Ghost in my Ghostwalk campaign, he's died and come back, died as a ghost and been ressurrected- as a ghost, meaning they took the gentle reposed ectoplasm and rez'd him as a ghost. However, as part of circumstance, his body has been...well placed elsewhere...so what if someone tries to ressurrect him, one of two things happen. He either agrees or disagrees to be raised.
I assume True Ressurection does the same, but you can do that WITHOUT a body, so he could do that and forgo the fact that his body was napped.Anyway, thoughts, comments are appreciated, my questions are:
1. How does a Cleric know when an undead corpse is, well undead?
2. How is a Ghostwalk Ghost affected by the spell Scry?
3. How is a Ghostwalk Ghost affected by ressurection spells? This partly assumes the use of an actual body and not ectoplasm (I have a fair idea how that works and glossed over it in my campaign since the PC was by himself and was ghostly ressurected by NPCs, maybe you need Ghostwalk for this, so I'll just look that over again before I respond to replies. I don't have it handy at the moment or I probably wouldn't be asking this question.)
4. How does Sacrificing someone affect their soul? (as in what ways does it affect the soul, not how can it- Book of Vile Darkness) Is it destroyed or some other metaphysical predicament forced upon it/them? I know d&d doesn't so much do soul as spirit...
Here is what I think...
1. I assume that by undead you don't mean a ghostwalk ghost, but an actual undead creature. Detect undead used on a corpse would definitely show it up as being an undead (unless magic was used to conceal it), otherwise you would need to use Knowledge (religion), which anyone can do if they have the skill (you don't need to be a cleric). Ghostwalk ghosts aren't undead creatures so detect undead doesn't work on them.
2. Ghostwalk ghosts are affected by scrying magic as normal. If the person doing the scrying has the ghost's physical remains then it becomes really easy ;)
3. Raise dead, resurrection, and true resurrection returns a ghostwalk ghost to their human body (even if they are alive as a ghost at the time). Raise ghost is a 4th-level spell that returns a ghost to life as a ghost. The other spells mentioned cannot raise a ghost as a ghost at all.
4. What happens to the soul after it is sacrificed is up to you. if it was eaten by a demon, or used to power a dark spell then the soul is probably gone. Otherwise, the sacrificed creature can be returned to life as normal (unless some entity prevents this from happening).
1. I assume you mean a corpse that was dead, became undead, then was re-deaded for some reason. In that cse, I'd say a Heal check to note the presence of necrotic tissues and such.
4. As Phil said, but I'd throw in the good ol' clause, "Unless a deity intervenes." Then you can get the soul back. :)
1. I assume you mean a corpse that was dead, became undead, then was re-deaded for some reason. In that cse, I'd say a Heal check to note the presence of necrotic tissues and such.
Well, the former zombie dwarf in question was a zombie for less than a minute, killed by positive energy...so as far as necrotic tissue, I'm not convinced?
In Ghostwalk, it is presumed that the Deathwarden Dwarves know when a corpse is that of an undead creature, but there is ALSO the presumption that undead corpses make it through the veil of souls (where the Deathwarden's put bodies of the dead), and quite often at that, and under the circumstances it'll be more likely for some to slip through the cracks I would say...
I'll leave identification up to the players then, if Drotto says that his brother was turned into a zombie, then the corpse will be destroyed, if he just says it was his brother, then I'll leave it up to the low level Deathwarden Dwarf to see whether or not it was an undead dwarf, but I doubt he'll do that.
1. I assume that by undead you don't mean a ghostwalk ghost, but an actual undead creature. Detect undead used on a corpse would definitely show it up as being an undead (unless magic was used to conceal it), otherwise you would need to use Knowledge (religion), which anyone can do if they have the skill (you don't need to be a cleric). Ghostwalk ghosts aren't undead creatures so detect undead doesn't work on them.
2. Ghostwalk ghosts are affected by scrying magic as normal. If the person doing the scrying has the ghost's physical remains then it becomes really easy ;)
3. Raise dead, resurrection, and true resurrection returns a ghostwalk ghost to their human body (even if they are alive as a ghost at the time). Raise ghost is a 4th-level spell that returns a ghost to life as a ghost. The other spells mentioned cannot raise a ghost as a ghost at all.
4. What happens to the soul after it is sacrificed is up to you. if it was eaten by a demon, or used to power a dark spell then the soul is probably gone. Otherwise, the sacrificed creature can be returned to life as normal (unless some entity prevents this from happening).
1. Yes, ghostwalk ghosts are incorporeal outsiders, and i do mean "This guy was a zombie" undead. Knowledge (Religion) works, as does Detect Undead, though on a corpse, something devoid of negative energy, I'm not convinced it'll work.
2. Then the PC is quite possibly screwed.
3. Yeah, I used Raise Ghost, it was pretty easy actually to just go with that instead of letting his remains (ectoplasmic goo) disapate...As far as ressurecting him, no special rules apply, it's ressurection or raise dead as per normal (save if it was done in manifest, then he wouldn't lose anything. And I'll say it is within the Manifest Ward, or close enough to count. IE. Near a Skystone)
4. If the victim is just tortured and killed I'll probably have the soul escape (which means, they could come back as a ghost, in theory), if it is being sacrificed to a deity/demon prince or eaten by a demon as you say, then I'll probably not allow such an escape and would presume it is destroyed, but I'll look over the Book of Vile Darkness though I know it is really just my call.