I’m wondering how other DM’s would think is a fair and semi-realistic way for a party to recover a body that fell into the river from Schloss Caromark. My group will be playing this tomorrow and since they do not have a rogue or a way to fly or levitate I’m pretty sure a few will fall off the bridge and die from the fall and get swept down stream.
I have no idea how this would be in real life or how long it would take to do a search and rescue. I’m thinking I will roll a 1-50 roll (d100/2). 1-30 represents how many miles down stream the body went. 31-40 the body was found in Lepidstadt floating down the river. 41-50 the body is lodged under water with no chance of recovery. Each day the body lies there, there is a 20% change some critters find it and eat it. The party can go ½ movement rate and search if they make a Survival 20 roll, otherwise they go ¼ movement and search. When they get to the area where I determined the body to be they have a perception 20 roll to spot it. If the body was recovered it Lepidstadt all items carried are missing. If down stream somewhere a 5% chance per day someone comes across the body and takes all the items.
Does this sound fair and semi-realistic?
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I was thinking about this myself. They might stand a chance of survival, albeit not a great one...
Areas F, G, and H are 100 feet above the upper river, while areas I and J are 150 feet above the lower river below the falls. Areas K and L are built 200 feet above the churning waters...Characters that fall into the upper river may also be swept over a waterfall and suffer further damage from the 50-foot fall to the lower river.
Falling into Water: If the water is at least 10 feet deep, the first 20 feet of falling do no damage. The next 20 feet do nonlethal damage (1d3 per 10-foot increment). Beyond that, falling damage is lethal damage (1d6 per additional 10-foot increment).Characters who deliberately dive into water take no damage on a successful DC 15 Swim check or DC 15 Acrobatics check, so long as the water is at least 10 feet deep for every 30 feet fallen. The DC of the check, however, increases by 5 for every 50 feet of the dive.
So , assuming they fall from F, G, or H, they'll take 2d3 nonlethal damage and 6d6 lethal damage. That's not terrible, and by that level PCs should be able to survive that. If they fall from I or J, the lethal damage goes up to 11d6. The survivability of 11d6 at that level is up to the dice, it could kill a PC. Falling from K or L, that's going to be pretty dangerous. It'll deal 16d6, and if the PC survives that, they'll need to make a DC 20 Swim check or go over the falls for another 2d3 nonlethal damage and 3d6 lethal.
That all said, I don't think you need to roll for what happens to the body. Use your judgement as GM to determine if the party should be allowed find the PC and his equipment. If they're having a really rough time of it, they might find the deceased PCs and his gear float up either in the swamp or Lepidstadt (wherever they head first, unless you want to spend a lot of time mucking about in the swamp). If things are going alright (except for PCs falling to their deaths, natch), then maybe they just find a few items washed up in the swamp.
Myself, I plan for a strange encounter with a Boruta, should any PCs go tumbling over the cliffs. I don't know when else those swamp things show up, but I do like them.
I'm thinking the fall from the 50' waterfall will not be into 10 ft of water and will cause 5d6 of damage for that fall. Every waterfall I can think of lands in rocks or careems of rocks on the way down. A Swim check of 20 is needed to the edge without being washed down stream, both above and again below the waterfall. If the PC is heavily weighted down with armor, etc, the body will not be recoved, if lightly geared the body will float all the way to Lepidstadt. 50/50 chance of gear being stolen.
My party hates auto deaths so having rolls to survive, or a reason why a body is or is not found is needed. If I simply say the body can not be recovered they will get pissed off. If I say the body can not be recovered because it was weighted down with armor and is on the bottom somewhere then they can accept that.
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Personally I am a carefree lazy GM. You have already put more thought then I ever would into this. However I can appreciate you being proactive and knowing your players /gold star.
Are they willing to derail the campaign to find a body and its items? I would just have them roll a survival check to find the body. I would roll a percentile of some type to have the items with the body if they did find it. Would that be good enough for them?
Ends up my party made it across all the bridges with only one player taking a dip. A Paladin of Sarenrae got bull rushed by the Golem hound. But he fell in only 5ft form the cliffs near the Gatehouse. He made 1 swim check reached the rocks and avoided going over the falls.