I'm curious how many folks out there are like me in that the majority of my characters always make it abundantly clear to the party that should they die, do NOT reincarnate them. They'll come back through raise dead or resurrection, but not reincarnate. It may be metagaming to an extent, but if I wanted to play a Bugbear or an Orc I would have made one in the first place. The guy in our games who always plays the Druid is baffled as to why myself and several other players in our group always take this stance. I think it's an interesting spell that could offer some interesting RP but I'd not allow it to be cast on a good 80% of my characters.
For a goofy campaign, it can be fun to "roll the dice". But in a more serious campaign, having your human barbarian come back as a kobold can be a bit off-putting.
I think it is awesome but If you are really attached to the PC you have than I can understand a refusal.
|
People are more interested in the mechanical aspects of the game these days. "My human barbarian would lose strength if he came back as a halfling...." or "it would screw up my build" is usually what I hear. I even let them come back at exactly the same level with no penalties and the players rarely do it. I've even made resurrection not available and they still would rather take a hit with raise dead.
Gone are the days of roleplaying a PC being put into a different form, mostly because the game has gotten so complex that people don't want to deal with a change(suboptimal or not, it's not worth the risk) after investing huge amounts of hours pouring over rulebooks to design a PC.
My players would rather just start from scratch and that makes me sad.
I've always kinda liked it as a spell.
Sure it's random but it's cheaper and less time sensitive to get off than raise dead.
Yeah suddenly becoming a dwarf could be a problem ;) but it's an opportunity for roleplaying.
There are some quirks I don't like about it though.
Does a dwarf retain his defensive training and stability racial traits? Even if he's suddenly in the body of a tall, weedy elf. Keeping defensive training would make sense but stability or slow and steady? Not really, however by RAW they keep everything of the original character except for racial adjustments to abilities.
It's stuff like those discrepancies that cause me to be leery of using it.
I also liked it better when you could turn into an animal...
|
|
I've always kinda liked it as a spell.
Sure it's random but it's cheaper and less time sensitive to get off than raise dead.
Yeah suddenly becoming a dwarf could be a problem ;) but it's an opportunity for roleplaying.
There are some quirks I don't like about it though.
Does a dwarf retain his defensive training and stability racial traits? Even if he's suddenly in the body of a tall, weedy elf. Keeping defensive training would make sense but stability or slow and steady? Not really, however by RAW they keep everything of the original character except for racial adjustments to abilities.
It's stuff like those discrepancies that cause me to be leery of using it.
I also liked it better when you could turn into an animal...
I still use the old charts, it's neat and I always work with the players to make sure that they can still function well in the new form (like allowing them to swap out a feat to gain the ability to spellcast as a badger, or switching up the weapon specific feats to match a new form and such).
|
I personally love reincarnate. I've been playing for 4.5 years now (mostly in 3.5 and pathfinder)
Whether or not a character will take an reincarnate or not depends on the character's background and personality.
Out of the characters I've played, only one would absolutely reject a reincarnate (a snobby noblegirl), and another would reject depending on what she was coming back as (a sorcerer/cleric of Calistria). My ranger would only object if she came back as a goblin or giant (favored enemies). That ranger, in fact, went looking for a druid to reincarnate her animal companion after it was killed in battle.
My epic druid loved to reincarnate her followers. She once made a kender into a halfling. (transferred from her home world (greyhawk) to dragonlance)
One thing about reincarnate that I don't think many people realize is that you can live forever this way. You are alwaysbrought back into a young adult body. It would make for an interesting epic encounter to find a 40th level wizard in the body of a kobold. ha ha!!
|
Does a dwarf retain his defensive training and stability racial traits? Even if he's suddenly in the body of a tall, weedy elf. Keeping defensive training would make sense but stability or slow and steady? Not really, however by RAW they keep everything of the original character except for racial adjustments to abilities.
This spell gets used quite a bit in the games I've run and I generally allow the PC to keep racial trtaits that aren't biologically tied to the character. In the case of a dwarf becoming an elf, for instance, I'd allow the dwarf to keep his Dwarf Weapon Proficiencies, Hatred, Giant-fighting and Greed, but he'd lose Stability, Darkvision and Slow but Steady since those are tied to a dwarf's physiology. Likewise, the only thing he'd gain from becoming an elf is Lowlight Vision and Keen Senses because pretty much everything else is tied into an elf's upbringing and culture.
Nothing better then having a charismatic womanizer reincarnated into a hot woman's body. :)
And that describes my current character running through RotRL :)
It took a few deaths for that to occur, there was a running gag for a bit that he died once per module. Started out as a male Human Rogue, died assaulting a goblin fort, and came back as an male Elf, died during an interlude in the second module, came Reincarnated as a male Half Elf, and finally got criticaled in the surprise round by a hill giant with a great axe. They are now a Female Fetchling (Shadow Touched Human) and haven't had to be reincarnated again, she even made it through the whole 5th module without a single death. For good measure she now has Defensive Roll and the Graverisen feat from the Legacy of Fire players guide.
My main issue with Reincarnate is it takes a 9th level spell to get your old body back, making it something that can stick with your character for the rest of their adventuring careerer. Having said that it can also be an interesting character hook and motivation, a previous character in an Eberron game died as an elf, came back as a hobgoblin and was endeavouring to find a way to get an elven body back, unfortunately the game stopped before his quest (or the main story line) could be finished.
The only thing I don't like about the spell is how vague it is on the mechanical aspects of becoming a new creature.
Does a human reincarnated as an orc keep his racial skill and feat, for example?
The spell basically says "you change" without exactly telling you how to work the change.
Spells like that are annoying. In terms of concept, it's a great spell.
In a fairly recent campaign, our group was facing a Glabrezu (and a few succubi I think). We had brought it close to death, when he rolled well and took out our Cleric.
With the creature nearly dead as well, we forced a negotiation: use it's wish to bring our dead friend back to life, or we land the finishing blow (banishing it for 100 years or whatever).
It agreed... however instead of casting Raise Dead (I don't think you can cast Resurrection as it's a 7th level divine spell), it cast Reincarnate.
Our fault really, we didn't specify the spell we wanted cast (non of us were divine casters, so in-character knowledge was lacking), and it's a Glabrezu's job to twist his granted Wish as much as he can.
So the Human Cleric came back as a Half-Orc. Which was a hilarious moment, since the campaign had a major Half-Orc population (and had a recently killed-despite-being-immortal half-orc emperor).
From that point onward, we were pushing towards our Cleric friend to be the replacing/competing head of the religious faction... you know.. now that he's "one of them".
.
While I'm a big proponent for "playing the character concept you wanted" when making characters... once the game has started, anything's fair game.
I personally love the idea of the Reincarnate spell simply because it throws you a curve-ball. It's a shame it doesn't (be default) have the chance of changing gender on you too... but I guess that might ruffle a few too many feathers out there.
The only thing I don't like about the spell is how vague it is on the mechanical aspects of becoming a new creature.
Does a human reincarnated as an orc keep his racial skill and feat, for example?
The spell basically says "you change" without exactly telling you how to work the change.
Spells like that are annoying. In terms of concept, it's a great spell.
This is why I would have liked to see the races section get a minor change to divide what's considered a "physical racial trait" and what's considered a "cultural racial trait".
This would help me as a DM with a number of things... not just for what is changed with a Reincarnation, but also for things like a gnome being raised in a Halfling society, etc.
I personally would say that the bonus skill points and feat from being human are a function of human mental traits and not a function of human physiology.
Besides removing x skillpoints and a feat would be time consuming, especially if the human bonus feat was a prerequisite for other feats in a feat chain :|
So while a human who reincarnates as a dwarf would get some dwarven physical traits without having to give up any of his human benefits it's really not worth taking the 2 permanent negative levels to try to win the reincarnate lottery. After all you could always get kobold!
Actually you don't know much about who's bringing you back from the dead. Their alignment and name I believe. So in game you have no real control, which makes this a metagame question.
Actually you don't know much about who's bringing you back from the dead. Their alignment and name I believe. So in game you have no real control, which makes this a metagame question.
Well in theory someone can cast Speak with Dead prior to casting reincarnate,raise dead,etc.
"Hey Bob, sorry you got hit by that Frost Giant, if we were to you know cast reincarnate on you, would you be cool with that?"
That way you could at least be certain that the spell would work prior to casting.
So in game you have no real control,
Yes you do.
"If the subject’s soul is not willing to return, the spell does
not work"
Since Raise Dead and Reincarnation are from two wildly different schools of magic, and you know the name and alignment, you could easily feel what is happening, and refuse it on that basis.
Personally I think Reincarnate could produce some fun situations, though I've never run into a situation calling for it myself. I'm kinda with Kaisoku on this one. If something happens to your character in-game, you'll have to deal with it (unless it's a result of your GM being unfair).
Reincarnate? Love it.
If your character is some religious nut or some-such, I could see in-character reasons to oppose it,
but otherwise it just seems like an issue of the player being overly attached to their character build.
As mentioned "If something happens to your character, you have to deal with it".
Real-world, I think of the French woman who had a face transplant after a horrendous accident.
Seriously there is some intense role-playing stemming from it, but not something I feel should be shied away from.
Best reincarnate ever, the dead pixie sorcerer was transformed into a centaur back in 3.0e. It seems a bit of a put off at first, but when they leveled he was able to retrain and actually found the roleplaying experience flavorful.
Worst ever, the dead barbarian came back as a squirrel.
I have to say I think this is a really cool spell or really crappy, depending on your GM's 'be a jerk vs have fun' factor.
Worst ever, the dead barbarian came back as a squirrel.
Squirrel with Knockback and Strength Surge... Sounds crazy...
The few times it came up when we played, we houseruled that the dead PC rolls twice and picked the better of the two.
Worst ever, the dead barbarian came back as a squirrel.Squirrel with Knockback and Strength Surge... Sounds crazy...
Whatever you do, don't touch his nuts. :)
My WILL was weak.
In my CoCT campaign our dwarf ranger came back as a full-blooded orc after reincarnation. He hated himself so much and with his new 3 charisma, everyone else felt the same way.
In the campaign I play im, reincarnate is the only raise dead option we have available as we don't have a cleric. That is outside of throwing them in the bag of holding and taking them to a cleric ;)
The OP has a great point. Reincarnate really just strikes me as a way for the DM to screw with players.
... or to built a cool narrative WITH the player. I've use reincarnate three times and every time it led to awesome character development. Actually, my most satisfying side-quest EVER was triggered by a character's reincarnation...
But I can see how it can go the other way as well. I think its fair to provide a check box for "do not reincarnate" on the character's donor card...
'findel
I've had a character before who's whole point to adventure was to pay off the costs of a reincarnate spell. Before the game he was a human but the reincarnate turned him half elf... he was still trying to pay it off when we ended several months later.
I play probably the most gimped race in the book now, humans; and the one advantage they do have is that when they die, they can get reincarnate with out losing any of their racial abilities, except they physical bonuses if they put their bonus stat there.
I also liked it better when you could turn into an animal...
My second character in 3.0 was the Witch variant in the DMG. During the first or second adventure, he got crushed by giant's bolders and died. The druid brought me back as a wolf (and the DM was cool with allowing me to still cast spells in my new form). I had a blast with that character. We were actually just talking about him the other day. :)
I play probably the most gimped race in the book now, humans; and the one advantage they do have is that when they die, they can get reincarnate with out losing any of their racial abilities, except they physical bonuses if they put their bonus stat there.
humans are gimped enough. i wouldn't even make humans lose thier physical bonus if they chose that w/ thier racial bonus. this would apply to 1/2 elves and 1/2 orcs as well. it's the result of years of hard development. elves, dwarves etc, are born with thier physical boni and those would change as they are a biological aspect. but i wouldn't allow being reincarnated as the same race to stack modifiers.
I play probably the most gimped race in the book now, humans; and the one advantage they do have is that when they die, they can get reincarnate with out losing any of their racial abilities, except they physical bonuses if they put their bonus stat there.humans are gimped enough. i wouldn't even make humans lose thier physical bonus if they chose that w/ thier racial bonus. this would apply to 1/2 elves and 1/2 orcs as well. it's the result of years of hard development. elves, dwarves etc, are born with thier physical boni and those would change as they are a biological aspect. but i wouldn't allow being reincarnated as the same race to stack modifiers.
Well IDK about the Half Orcs, but the half elves... I would leave them as is, they get to keep too many abilities, and are generally supirior to humans in many ways, IMHO. But people may differ.
I'm curious how many folks out there are like me in that the majority of my characters always make it abundantly clear to the party that should they die, do NOT reincarnate them. They'll come back through raise dead or resurrection, but not reincarnate. It may be metagaming to an extent, but if I wanted to play a Bugbear or an Orc I would have made one in the first place. The guy in our games who always plays the Druid is baffled as to why myself and several other players in our group always take this stance. I think it's an interesting spell that could offer some interesting RP but I'd not allow it to be cast on a good 80% of my characters.
For "revival" spells I thought the soul had to choose to come back. I can't seem to find that rule though.
Well IDK about the Half Orcs, but the half elves... I would leave them as is, they get to keep too many abilities, and are generally supirior to humans in many ways, IMHO. But people may differ.I play probably the most gimped race in the book now, humans; and the one advantage they do have is that when they die, they can get reincarnate with out losing any of their racial abilities, except they physical bonuses if they put their bonus stat there.humans are gimped enough. i wouldn't even make humans lose thier physical bonus if they chose that w/ thier racial bonus. this would apply to 1/2 elves and 1/2 orcs as well. it's the result of years of hard development. elves, dwarves etc, are born with thier physical boni and those would change as they are a biological aspect. but i wouldn't allow being reincarnated as the same race to stack modifiers.
lets fix that, this ruling was meant to apply exclusively to humans and i thought there would be arguments saying "What about the 1/2 elf and the 1/2 orc?" really, i agree it should be a human only privelege.
i'd give this 2nd ruling
scratch off former references to 1/2 elves and 1/2 orcs keeping their free bonus. treat it as a human only privelege.
Reincarnate has a very powerful and often overlooked benefit - it grants effective immortality. It is the only spell that can raise a creature that died of old age and, since it puts the character into a young adult body, it can also be used to grant eternal youth. For a high level character, it's not hard to afford 1,000g for another casting if you don't like your new body. Just kill yourself and play reincarnate roulette again. If it means that much to you, you can even use Wish or Miracle to change yourself back to your original race and appearance. For just 1,000g more than True Resurrection, you not only were raised back to life, you also get to be young again!
I don't like it... Partly because it's not so fun to become a human or an elf when you played a dwarf, partly because the name is misleading : it doesn't simply incarnate you, it creates you a new body.
My group made a variant : it really reincarnates you, in a random living thing in a one mile area of the caster - including the caster himself, the other players and the NPCs. Roll on the encounter tables and cross your fingers to not become a black pudding. Target creature gets a will save.
Reincarnate has a very powerful and often overlooked benefit - it grants effective immortality. It is the only spell that can raise a creature that died of old age and, since it puts the character into a young adult body, it can also be used to grant eternal youth. For a high level character, it's not hard to afford 1,000g for another casting if you don't like your new body. Just kill yourself and play reincarnate roulette again. If it means that much to you, you can even use Wish or Miracle to change yourself back to your original race and appearance. For just 1,000g more than True Resurrection, you not only were raised back to life, you also get to be young again!
I actually had that for the religious leaders for one of my countries. They're all high-level druids who, when they get old or have died due to an assassination attempt or something, are reincarnated by one of the others. If they get old they commit ritual suicide in a large ceremony, and are then joyously reborn. This has made their forms matter on a political scale, because they often say the form is a message from the earth herself.
We've had 2 characters [1 PC and 1 NPC] come back via Reincarnate as Half-Orcs which has been nothing but great for the game. We like!
Our DM allows one re-roll, but only 1 !
Chaos=fun.
Well IDK about the Half Orcs, but the half elves... I would leave them as is, they get to keep too many abilities, and are generally supirior to humans in many ways, IMHO. But people may differ.I play probably the most gimped race in the book now, humans; and the one advantage they do have is that when they die, they can get reincarnate with out losing any of their racial abilities, except they physical bonuses if they put their bonus stat there.humans are gimped enough. i wouldn't even make humans lose thier physical bonus if they chose that w/ thier racial bonus. this would apply to 1/2 elves and 1/2 orcs as well. it's the result of years of hard development. elves, dwarves etc, are born with thier physical boni and those would change as they are a biological aspect. but i wouldn't allow being reincarnated as the same race to stack modifiers.lets fix that, this ruling was meant to apply exclusively to humans and i thought there would be arguments saying "What about the 1/2 elf and the 1/2 orc?" really, i agree it should be a human only privelege.
i'd give this 2nd ruling
scratch off former references to 1/2 elves and 1/2 orcs keeping their free bonus. treat it as a human only privelege.
COOLZ, we in in concurrence. XD
P.S. Hmmm just a thought, how powerful would a half-elf that becomes a normal elf, especially if they put their bonus into a mental stat?
|
|
Reincarnate has a very powerful and often overlooked benefit - it grants effective immortality. It is the only spell that can raise a creature that died of old age and, since it puts the character into a young adult body, it can also be used to grant eternal youth. For a high level character, it's not hard to afford 1,000g for another casting if you don't like your new body. Just kill yourself and play reincarnate roulette again. If it means that much to you, you can even use Wish or Miracle to change yourself back to your original race and appearance. For just 1,000g more than True Resurrection, you not only were raised back to life, you also get to be young again!I actually had that for the religious leaders for one of my countries. They're all high-level druids who, when they get old or have died due to an assassination attempt or something, are reincarnated by one of the others. If they get old they commit ritual suicide in a large ceremony, and are then joyously reborn. This has made their forms matter on a political scale, because they often say the form is a message from the earth herself.
Two words.....Awe Some! I love the concept...
Two words.....Awe Some! I love the concept...Reincarnate has a very powerful and often overlooked benefit - it grants effective immortality. It is the only spell that can raise a creature that died of old age and, since it puts the character into a young adult body, it can also be used to grant eternal youth. For a high level character, it's not hard to afford 1,000g for another casting if you don't like your new body. Just kill yourself and play reincarnate roulette again. If it means that much to you, you can even use Wish or Miracle to change yourself back to your original race and appearance. For just 1,000g more than True Resurrection, you not only were raised back to life, you also get to be young again!I actually had that for the religious leaders for one of my countries. They're all high-level druids who, when they get old or have died due to an assassination attempt or something, are reincarnated by one of the others. If they get old they commit ritual suicide in a large ceremony, and are then joyously reborn. This has made their forms matter on a political scale, because they often say the form is a message from the earth herself.
The country has started to try and entice barbarian tribes in because of the forms of their members, two of whom are a gnoll and a kobold! The country is in general fairly open, but they disdain "improperly used" divine magic, meaning any from an actual god. Their clerics ("druid knights") follow the earth, but not as an abstract concept, and can never select an alignment domain. This means restoration is still an option for those guys, so I don't have a bunch of druids with negative levels out the wazoo sitting around. The material component for the spell only comes from an ancient immortal tree that is revered and protected by the druids, meaning they also control who can and cannot be reincarnated.
Of course, they have their own agenda. The druid in one of my groups was reincarnated by the half-elven member of the group, and strangely enough she was right nearby when he had just finished fighting an evil druid... In a completely different country.
|
The rule on reincarnate is fairly clear. You lose ALL of your old racial modifiers and gain those of your new form. So yes that includes the defensive training and things like that because they draw on fundamentals you no longer posess. So a gnome reincarnated to a Kobold no longer has his bonuses against Kobolds.
And that sucks, because the bonus isn't something that's in the gnome's blood.
Hatred: Gnomes receive a +1 bonus on attack rolls against humanoid creatures of the reptilian and goblinoid subtypes due to special training against these hated foes.
Special training means they had to work for it, for years. If it was a bonus from favored enemy, would the bonus go away when the ranger was reincarnated?
EDIT: I realize that is a bad analogy. Feel free to ignore the part concerning favored enemies.
The subject of the spell gains two permanent negative levels when it is reincarnated.
The circle of druids mentioned upthread must have a friendly high-level cleric nearby in order to cast Restoration (costing them another 2000gp).
Now, is it possible to use Restoration to get a body of a race with a positive Level Adjustment (and, yes, I know this term doesn't exist anymore)?
First eliminate the subject's racial adjustments (since it is no longer necessarily of his previous race) and then apply the adjustments found below to its remaining ability scores.
...seems OK, if you didn't have plusses to mental stats you were counting on. If you get Reincarnated in, say, a Bugbear, that gives you a net +8 to physical stats. Joy :|
The rule on reincarnate is fairly clear. You lose ALL of your old racial modifiers and gain those of your new form. So yes that includes the defensive training and things like that because they draw on fundamentals you no longer posess. So a gnome reincarnated to a Kobold no longer has his bonuses against Kobolds.
Actually no you don't lose all racial abilities
A reincarnated creature recalls the majority of its former life and form. It retains any class abilities, feats, or skill ranks it formerly possessed. Its class, base attack bonus, base save bonuses, and hit points are unchanged . Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution scores depend partly on the new body. First eliminate the subject's racial adjustments (since it is no longer necessarily of his previous race) and then apply the adjustments found below to its remaining ability scores.
So by RAW you keep the following:
Class Abilities
Feats
Skills
You lose:
Racial Adjustments to [physical] ability scores
You gain:
Racial Adjustments to [physical] ability scores
Not mentioned at all:
Racial Traits other than Ability Adjustments
Unless the text of the spell explicitly says you lose racial traits, the logical assumption is that your racial traits remain exactly the same. It's primary a ease of use thing to prevent you from having to rebuild your PC over from the ground up.
Of course it leads to counter-intuitive results. Presumably certain racial traits are a by-product of the physical body of the race.
Example: Dwarven Slow and Steady definitely seems to be a result of their body being dense and well muscled despite their relative lack of stature. If a Dwarf turns into a Goblin should he still get the ability to wear heavy armor at no penalty?
Stonecunning however seems to be a mental trait. It really doesn't make sense that a dwarf suddenly can't perceive new stone construction.
Further the spell clearly doesn't say anything about size and land speed. Does an elf in a gnome body get to use medium sized weapons and walk 30'? Is a halfling in an orc body limited to small sized weapons and a 20' move?
One solution would be to do as you suggest and remove all racial traits entirely. However that would result in a human reincarnated losing skill ranks and a bonus feat (the spell clearly indicates that skill ranks and feats do not change).
The result is that the spell is overly complex to adjudicate fairly without violating common sense and if it's hard to adjudicate in a manner that doesn't violate your player's sense of fairness and equity then it fails as a spell in some ways.
...seems OK, if you didn't have plusses to mental stats you were counting on. If you get Reincarnated in, say, a Bugbear, that gives you a net +8 to physical stats. Joy :|
Read the previous sentence:
Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution scores depend partly on the new body. First eliminate the subject’s racial adjustments (since it is no longer of his previous race) and then apply the adjustments found below to its remaining ability scores.
Mental stats don't change. You get to keep those precious bonuses to mental stats.
Becoming an dwarf is cool (net benefit of +2 to stats), bugbear is awesome (net benefit of +8 to stats) however people will probably try to kill you on sight... Kobold, hahaha you lost the lottery.
|
|
Mental stats don't change. You get to keep those precious bonuses to mental stats.Becoming an dwarf is cool (net benefit of +2 to stats), bugbear is awesome (net benefit of +8 to stats) however people will probably try to kill you on sight... Kobold, hahaha you lost the lottery.
Unless you are a caster, then you just gained small size bonuses, darkvision and a 30' movement rate. Sounds not so bad to me...
Only frikkin' way one of my DMs will ever let you be a non-Core race anyway...
*grumbles*