So one of my players is in need of raising after pulling a Leroy Jenkins.
And while looking up the total price to get him raised and restored to full level I was wondering wether i a spellcaster should actually demand the full price of spell level x his caster level x 10gp when casting a spell that isn't influenced by caster level.
Raise dead is spell level 5 so it takes a level 9 cleric at least so that's 5,450 gp including material.
Restoration is only level 4 could be cast by a level 7 cleric and doesn't get better basedo n caster level. So a single casting of that to restore a permanent negative level would be 1,280 gp including material, assuming it is a level 7 cleric casting the spell. But if the same cleric that raised him would cast the restoration it would become 1,360 gp, admittedly a small difference at this price range, but there is no benefit.
So my question is, would you price spellcasting services for spells that don't change with level at the actual caster level of the caster or at the minimum caster level required to cast the spell?
I would say that, if you were in a decent sized town that had a level 9 cleric, it probably also has a level 7 cleric.
As a GM, I would calculate the cost at the lowest level. No reason to gouge the player that just died.
The pricing guidelines are just guidelines assuming one spell per caster per payment. While it only takes a level 7 cleric, you already have found and paid a level 9 to do some stuff. The level 9 cleric's time is more valuable and thus it should cost more to get the NPC to do something a lower level NPC would do.
Alternatively, the NPC may offer a multi-spell discount package deal, or maybe they have a few acolytes of various levels to assist with the lesser spells, or perhaps the church itself takes the money for each spell and assigns a caster (taking care of the level appropriateness with one or more clerics as available).
If it is some random level 9 cleric in the wilderness, I'd probably assume full price for both. If it is a cleric in a city with a healthy divine caster population, I'd assume you are actually dealing with a church instead of a caster directly. In the second case, the church charges the 5450 for raise dead and 1280 for restoration, taking the whole consideration of actual caster level out of the equation.
They're in Corentyn right now, so they're most likely to run into a church of asmodeus i assume. Thanks to the party's abysmal knowledge (religion) skills they only know Asmodeus as what his worshippers introduced him to them as, the prince of law. I assume that Asmodeus priests wouldn't care too much what they raise as long as the price is right and the subject is not a wanted criminal.
And the only other temple anyone of them has found in the city so far was a small cellar shrine to zon kuthon somewhere in a back-alley where the last time one of the PCs asked to have something brought back from the dead, he came out with a cheap deal and a zombie cat.