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My question is basically: how do you handle resurrection/reincarnation in your games? Up to this point in my games I have never had to consider how to utilize this mechanic, but given the circumstances my players are clamoring for a chance to bring back their fallen comrade.
Ok in our last session we were wrapping up the last remnants of group of assassins. After killing most of the group and its leader the party turned its attention to mopping up a couple nameless henchmen who had wandered into the room mid fight. Our cleric was closest and moved to engage, which honestly seemed like a valid course of action (the clerics rolls were off the charts, he out melees our pally and rivals our fighter). So the cleric kills one and has almost finished off the other, so I roll the last attack for this henchman and like a dice possessed I rolled 20, 20, and a thrid 20. Which amounts to an insta-kill, the group was stunned. And so I resolved to give them a chance to bring him back. However i need help coming up with some rules for bring back the dead.
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Im looking for somthing more in depth than that. I dont want resurrection to be a commodity that only a few gp away...that cheapens both the gravity of death in game and the act of having ones life restored.
The player must be happy to jump through hoops in order to come back to life because gravity of a lucky shot from a mook
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That's a thematic issue, not a mechanical one.
As for how to solve it, make it not merely a matter of money, but of the favor of the God whose Cleric you petition. Make the PCs go on some sort of quest, either to find a major temple the Cleric's own deity or to earn the favor of another.
Or have their god raise them spontaneously with some vision of a quest he needs them to accomplish.
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Im looking for somthing more in depth than that. I dont want resurrection to be a commodity that only a few gp away...that cheapens both the gravity of death in game and the act of having ones life restored.The player must be happy to jump through hoops in order to come back to life because gravity of a lucky shot from a mook
Ok and the alternative is to reverse time because it didnt happen at a critical plot point? Or should I treat it like a video game and restart at their last save so the BBEG can be the one to kill him? Im not going to deny the dice rolls because its inconvenient. Im allowing the player a chance to be resurrected because of the crazy circumstances of the characters death. In all honesty, he could just be dead with no chance at coming back. Im trying to give the players what they asked for and make it special. It wouldnt make sense in to go from having never used resurrection, just going to town and finding a cleric to cast raise dead.
Ok and the alternative is to reverse time because it didnt happen at a critical plot point? Or should I treat it like a video game and restart at their last save so the BBEG can be the one to kill him? Im not going to deny the dice rolls because its inconvenient. Im allowing the player a chance to be resurrected because of the crazy circumstances of the characters death. In all honesty, he could just be dead with no chance at coming back. Im trying to give the players what they asked for and make it special. It wouldnt make sense in to go from having never used resurrection, just going to town and finding a cleric to cast raise dead.Im looking for somthing more in depth than that. I dont want resurrection to be a commodity that only a few gp away...that cheapens both the gravity of death in game and the act of having ones life restored.The player must be happy to jump through hoops in order to come back to life because gravity of a lucky shot from a mook
As others have said, this is not a mechanics issue but a story one. You can have the cleric's god be so moved by his/her senseless death at the whims of fate that they sent the cleric's soul back to his/her body to finish the holy work that his/her cleric has sworn to do.
There's no reason to deny the dice rolls or do some wonky time travel. Just have the deity in question either bring the dead character back to life as a true miracle or have the clergy in a nearby town perform the service as the mechanics dictate but with the story, change as much as you want, that I listed above.
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I don't have much advice to give since, in my game, death is a really big deal, meaning that except for an undead-like existence of pain and suffering, there is not much that can be done when a character dies.
That aside, I find it really disturbing the number of people that, instead of simply giving advice, keep yapping about the fact that it is "a thematic issue, not a mechanical one." "is plot. Plot isn't a mechanic".
Seriously, I don't see the OP specifying that he need a mechanical solution, This thread wasn't posted in the "Rules" forum either, so I really don't see why all the fuss about it not being a "mechanical issue".
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That aside, I find it really disturbing the number of people that, instead of simply giving advice, keep yapping about the fact that it is "a thematic issue, not a mechanical one." "is plot. Plot isn't a mechanic".
Seriously, I don't see the OP specifying that he need a mechanical solution, This thread wasn't posted in the "Rules" forum either, so I really don't see why all the fuss about it not being a "mechanical issue".
To quote the OP: "Up to this point in my games I have never had to consider how to utilize this mechanic"
Now, clearly, the intent wasn't to make it a mechanics question, and I certainly tried to be helpful after that was clear, but the mistake is understandable.
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The thing is, people often runs into the issue because you look at it from the point of view of Someone is coming back to life. To be quite honest, player characters are special and are not just anyone, most people can't afford it, it's not really a commodity. On top of it, they have a lot of gold and also for good parties, have favors or did help people in the past, that are willing to provide assistance. Plus do remember that when it comes to Resurrection, unless the person agrees to be resurrected...it doesn't work, guess it would be a dick move for a player to let characters gather the gold/material for Resurrection and just say no at the last minute...but yeah it can happen.
I don't have much advice to give since, in my game, death is a really big deal, meaning that except for an undead-like existence of pain and suffering, there is not much that can be done when a character dies.
That aside, I find it really disturbing the number of people that, instead of simply giving advice, keep yapping about the fact that it is "a thematic issue, not a mechanical one." "is plot. Plot isn't a mechanic".
Seriously, I don't see the OP specifying that he need a mechanical solution, This thread wasn't posted in the "Rules" forum either, so I really don't see why all the fuss about it not being a "mechanical issue".
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However i need help coming up with some rules for bring back the dead.
Sounds like a rules issue to me.
If he wanted thematic advice, he should have specified it in the first post. It isn't the fault of other posters that he couldn't express his desires clearly.
If he wants *useful* thematic advice, he also should specify what he wants to achieve in detail. Not just "I want resurrection to be available, but not as simple as paying a guy a few kgp to wave their arms around". With a request that vague the OP is going to get a lot of responses like "OK?...add something else in maybe...IDK what you want from us".
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The simplest solution is that their god brings them back to life; probably with a quest to complete. you could have the other players go on the quest first, but that sidelines the player in question for a few scenarios.
Or if you want to get a little more creative you could have him return to life and then start dropping hints that he was resurrected by something nasty for evil purposes, and/ or have him come back wrong; come up with some flavorful mechanical penalty's to give him such as Negative energy affinity, the party can try to find a cure of just live with it.
Of I suppose you could have a Devil appear and offer the party a Deal for the guys life.
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If you want to add gravity and meaning to death and resurrection, the place to do it isn't in the mechanics, but rather in the fluff of the world. Maybe you find a cleric powerful enough to do it. Maybe they are of an appropriate religion. But they should truly question the motives of why they want to revive their fallen comrade, and whether that comrade would want to return from a well deserved afterlife.
This is doubly true for goodly creatures and clerics. You died a good death, as a hero, fighting against murderers. Your companions are alive, you were victorious dead, and you now rest at peace in the heavens and your god. Why would you want to be ripped away from that? If there something that the character truly feels is unfinished? Start asking these questions IC.
If they do resurrect said character, you might draw on some pop culture material. Buffy the Vampire Slayer touched on this very topic. The actual resurrection was easy to achieve, but the repercussions of it were long lasting for the resurrected character. Maybe they have nightmares. Maybe they have visions. This is where you get to earn your chops as a GM.
You can even have the cleric who provides the service also give warning about the fates of those who are returned to life. We had an odd sort of dynamic going for a while in our game where everyone that was resurrected ended up dying in a much more horrible way (coincidentally). Resurrected a child killed on accident? He's later killed in a much more painful way by a group of cultists. PC fighter comes back to life, but later becomes a vessel for a powerful demon. Ect. You don't have to apply a mechanic here to give weight to things. It has actually gotten to the point where in our game, despite powerful spellcasters and lots of wealth most of the PCs question the idea of resurrecting anyone, for any reason, including each other. A couple of PCs IC are on record as saying that they want to stay down, as it were, rather than tempt fate. This all without a single mechanical change to how it works.
At least that would be my take.
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I asked for advice on implementing a a part of the game that untill now I had not made use of. And in doing so, place limitations on that aspect of the game so that it doesn't cheapen the game. Is this clear enough? Now would you call those rules, or plot, or guidelines...Im just not sure.
I sure hope that helps clear up the thematic/mechanic/plot/rules dilemma or not. If my request was not understood because I misused one word or interpreted its meaning and scope differently than you, I apologize. Next time Ill ask the people at Giant in the Playground or WotC.
Thank you to those of you who were able to interpret my means and offered actual advice instead of being a RAW D-bag.
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This is where all clerics you find are too low-level for raise dead. Another idea would be having a witch in a not so friendly enviroment like a forest or unhollowed cave near the ruins of a now undead civilization, perhaps offering some kind of ambiguity behind the cost of bringing the character back.
I'd say a more involving way for the recently slain would be him roleplay his dead/soul and interact with him as the diety or have him reach whatever plain corresponds with his alignment. Could give him an active role in seeking knowledge, guidance and request a significant request, to return to the material plane and stop those, like the thug, from claiming more victims.
In hindsight, what kind of adventure/module are you playing?
If your player is really patient you could bring him back as an undead, mayhaps cursed by bbeg or have him sired from one of the many assassins, return him as a crazed vampire, have him restored. Same guy, but now follows dhampir rules
Maybe the only way to resurrect people is through the church of Pharasma (or whichever deity is appropriate if you play in a different setting) and the remaining PCs have to convince them as to why this one person should be excused from the natural course of things and brought back to life.
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Necromancer Games has a 3.5 module for this most appropriately called DM2 Raise the Dead. (Some reviews here)
The book contains 4 adventures for parties that have lost a fellow PC, and seek to bring them back to life. No more “Well, you go back to town, pay the priest, and head back to the dungeon…” treatment. These are good adventures, and the common thread is a problem for many DMs to overcome.
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I really don't get why people are so against ressurections. When i GM i badly encourage peple to rez instead of simply getting a new character, because it's way better for my story than having a constant tournover of different character, each of them missing some crucial part of the backstory of the campaign. I even go as far as giving them free rez for service rendered, and i assure this has never put a dent in the survival instincts of my players.
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I really don't get why people are so against ressurections. When i GM i badly encourage peple to rez instead of simply getting a new character, because it's way better for my story than having a constant tournover of different character, each of them missing some crucial part of the backstory of the campaign. I even go as far as giving them free rez for service rendered, and i assure this has never put a dent in the survival instincts of my players.
There are competing interests here.
1. I want death to be meaningful and a real threat, and resurrection to be rare and similarly meaningful. We are literally talking about life and death, and many people dislike the revolving door method in which resurrection is something that commonly happens in groups.
2. I want to play / players to play the same characters and grow attached to them. This one is big for me personally, because what I enjoy about the game is the ability to have characters grow and evolve over time.
3. I don't want players sitting out long periods of time. And this one of course is a real problem when you are balancing the first two, because if you make resurrection difficult that often means time consuming, which means character out for a long time, which means the possibility of sitting around and twiddling your thumbs. Its bad enough when you die in the middle of a combat and spend hours waiting on it to wrap up - much less an entire dungeon.
This can be a very difficult bull to wrangle for GMs. I've played games where it took a quest through a long dungeon to resurrect a fallen PC (two in fact). I spent like four or five months (minimum) playing a stand in character that I had little attachment to while that was happening, and did miss major plot points with my main character as a result.
There is also a bit of generational play at work here. In the old days of the game it was relatively common to see new characters show up regularly, especially at lower levels. There are even memes about it. Some regard character death as not a big deal. Others get really upset. It varies.
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People grow more attached to a character when they know that they can rez them and carry it over the entire campaign. It's common knowledge that high death (or highly punishing death) campaign hurts character attachment. When you show up to your sessions with a backup pg, you know you don't care that much if your first one dies.
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My advice on making death meaningful: Don't.
Death in stories is meaningful because the author has complete control of when and who dies, and because as an artistic endeavor meaning is part and parcel of the whole thing.
Pathfinder is a game, where some bad luck can see a character dead pretty easily, and as a result death is cheap by design, because that really sucks. Not to mention all of the reasons Dekalinder and aboyd mentioned.
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Im allowing the player a chance to be resurrected because of the crazy circumstances of the characters death. In all honesty, he could just be dead with no chance at coming back.
Did you let your players know ahead of time that Raise Dead would not be available in your game? The game assumes that Raise Dead will be available to higher-level parties with cash. You don't get points for not taking away something that the players thought they could have.
However I sympathize with wanting to make coming back from the dead more of an event. In my current game I have decided that Raise Dead doesn't directly return the soul to the body - rather it Plane Shifts the caster and friends to the region of the afterlife in which the target's soul is. You have to find the soul and bring them back through the portal you entered by. To prevent the dead PC's player from getting bored, either make the "finding them" part very easy compared to getting out, or else provide them with a psychopomp to play for the first half.
No one has died yet but I think that this will provide significance to the event and also emphasize why not every rich person is always brought back from the dead - there's some amount of risk to plane shifting into purgatory and not everyone has someone will do that for them.
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Being oneshotted by a stroke of luck from a lowly mook is so anticlimatic that speaking of making death meaningful is almost pointless
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Being oneshotted by a stroke of luck from a lowly mook is so anticlimatic that speaking of making death meaningful is almost pointless
This is what I was going to say. The gravity and meaning of death went through the window when the minion being mopped up randomly killed the cleric in one hit.
Which is why the "3 nat 20s is an instakill" is a very problematic houserule. Not only because (as you saw), it instakills your players at very anticlimactic times, but it can also do away with important enemies and turn that encounter you spent hours planning into a 1-round affair.
My question is basically: how do you handle resurrection/reincarnation in your games? Up to this point in my games I have never had to consider how to utilize this mechanic, but given the circumstances my players are clamoring for a chance to bring back their fallen comrade.
Ok in our last session we were wrapping up the last remnants of group of assassins. After killing most of the group and its leader the party turned its attention to mopping up a couple nameless henchmen who had wandered into the room mid fight. Our cleric was closest and moved to engage, which honestly seemed like a valid course of action (the clerics rolls were off the charts, he out melees our pally and rivals our fighter). So the cleric kills one and has almost finished off the other, so I roll the last attack for this henchman and like a dice possessed I rolled 20, 20, and a thrid 20. Which amounts to an insta-kill, the group was stunned. And so I resolved to give them a chance to bring him back. However i need help coming up with some rules for bring back the dead.
You used a house rule "triple 20 = insta kill"
It's a fun rule!"However i need help coming up with some rules for bring back the dead."
That is a fun plot point, not a rule!
I know just having your players pay money to have the cleric brought back to life is not super awesome story point. However sitting at a table while your friends quest to bring you back sucks. I would suggest this alternative plan to satisfy all parties involved. Get the priest brought back to life (make it look cool it's a relatively high level spell), have his church ask for a service in exchange.
Being oneshotted by a stroke of luck from a lowly mook is so anticlimatic that speaking of making death meaningful is almost pointless
My advice on making death meaningful: Don't.
These guys have the right idea.
When an author kills a "PC" (main character) it's for a reason. Obi-Wan died for a very important reason - Luke needed to learn and grow, not rely on Obi-Wan to teach him everything and/or do all the dangerous stuff for him. Sure, sure, if Luke were real, he would need his mentor, but for the sake of a good story, Obi-Wan had served his purpose and now it was time for the real hero to do his heroic stuff. A good, thematic, meaningful death.
Your cleric died to a random stroke of luck from a nobody. His death had no meaning, n thematic purpose, no reason. It was just random dumb luck.
Trying to put a meaningful thematic purpose on the consequences when you put ZERO meaningful thematic purpose on the cause is like putting whipped cream on a dog turd - the result is still very unsatisfying.
Side note: this is a good argument to NOT use the optional triple-20 rule. It's fun but ultimately unimportant and unmemorable to kill Mook #697 with it. It's anti-climatic (and potentially sotry-ruining) to kill Boss #14 with it, and it's absolutely meaningless and nonsensical (not to mention probably story-breaking, or at least story-delaying) to kill PC #3 with it. And, ultimately, it will come around and kill PCs from time to time, for nor reason, as pure dumb luck.
If you're going to do that, at least don't hassle them when they try to put YOUR story back on track and when they try to bring that player's reason for playing back into the game so he can resume playing.
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1st:
We have a house-rule to make PC-Death more memorable and meaningful, then just paying of the You-died-Fee at the next temple / magic shop.
Its You loose 10% of your current XP when coming back. You never loose levels or other stuff through this, it just takes a little bit longer to reach the next level.
This stays with you, but gets less and less relevant as you progress through the levels. It also replaced the Raise-Dead-Gold-Tax of having to remove two "permanent" negative levels after a standart resurrection-effect.
2nd:
Removing remedys is payed from the loot, before dividing it up. So if someone got cursed in a dungeon crawl or even died in there, his cureing gets paid for by the Group. Thus an individual unfortunate event doesnt hit you as hard, but gets softened by the fact that your Adventureing Group will help restoreing you.
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I have always stated in all the group i've played and GMed: Unless something exceptional happened, someone death is always on the group. If the barb is doing his job on the frontline and takes one for the team, everybody chips in his share for the rez. The same goes for when someone backstabs the wizard ecc. It helps on so many levels that I actually find hard to explain it. Maybe someone else can do it.
What do you expect the player to do while he waits for his PC to be "meaningfully" brought back from the dead?
Should he make other plans for his time until his resurrection is sorted out, and not attend the game? Or is he expected to sit and watch everyone else go on an adventure?
You haven't given anything on your world background. If it is fairly high magic, like Golarion, then there are plenty of Clerics, Oracles, Witches etc that can perform this magic and getting to a town and casting the spell is probably all that is appropriate.
If your world has less magic, and people that can cast a 5th level spell are more rare, it would probably be ok for the caster in question to require more than money of the party. Some sort of quest or service would work, preferably after the spell is cast so the entire party can participate.
If you want to make the base rules of resurrection different (it doesn't exist, all the bring back from death are higher level spells or anything similar) this really should be announced and discussed prior to a campaign starting, not after someone has died and is trying to get brought back.
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There seems to be a problem with communication (what is meant by "mechanics" from the original poster). I do have an answer for Petty Alchemy about what a player can do while a PC is dead.
This is assuming the party is low enough level or far away from any means to resurrect a fallen PC without a long journey, or more money, or fulfilling a quest or two.
For games I run, I do allow a player to create a new character once their old PC has died. Granted, it is sometimes hard to work a new PC into a party - yet that will be true no matter how available resurrection is in a game.
The other PCs likely will be motivated to try resurrecting a PC. The player with a shiny new PC and a dead PC will have a choice once the means of resurrection is allowed - keep the new PC and retire the old one (likes the afterlife and chooses not to be resurrected, or is too traumatized by the experience and retires from adventuring, etc.). The player could play the resurrected PC, yet must give up the shiny replacement PC (quest fulfilled and must part ways, has other goals to accomplish and departs, retires to a quiet life, is murdered by a BBEG that has divination and proactively kills a threat even before learning the BBEG's existence).
What really fries the plot is when PCs are high enough level to just planar travel to the afterlife and visit all their old adventuring friends anyway.
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My advice: Roll with it. Death being a revolving door is hilarious.
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So the reason I had originally asked for suggestions as to how you handle the subject of returning characters to life is that, we havent had a need to explore that. Untill now characters who have died have been too low level to worry about and truth be told, I cant recall any higher level characters dying in my games. Maybe we have just been lucky, in that we have just never needed to use resurrection magic. As a result I thought it would be too dramatic of a change as was trying to limit its use. That being said, I have read all of the posts and discussed it with my players and I have cone to the conclusion that although it shouldnt be as simple as "pay gold to cleric, cleric casts spell". It should be made more available.
For this specific instance I am going to offer three potential methods of raising the character. The first would be through the cleric's church, and will be a standard Raise Dead spell which will require the diamond worth 5000gp as per the spell component, but will offer the restoration spells free of chrage. The second option will be through a witch the pc's must track down, this will result in a Reincarnation spell but the restoration cost will be on the pc's to find and pay for. Thirdly is through a necromancer who will preform the service free of cost but as a result of preforming some profane ritual the character is brought back as undead. For this I would apply the undead template, one permanent negative level that cant be restored and a permanent 10% spell check failure as a result of damage done to his divine conection for using evil arcane magic to pull his soul from his deity's afterlife.
Now my concern has turned from "To rez, or not to rez". How do I build a build an adventure arohnd each one other these diffrent methods. Number one seems easy enough, simple diamond heist should do the trick. But the other two, which are arguably cooler scenarios are proving a bit hard to plan an adventure for. Suggestions would be appreciated.
For anyone concerned about the player sitting out, we have a couple NPC that he could choose to run during this interruption in clerical service.
1st:
We have a house-rule to make PC-Death more memorable and meaningful, then just paying of the You-died-Fee at the next temple / magic shop.
I've noticed that every time someone opens with this theme, it finishes with a variation of ..."Penalise the player even more for dying, since the time sitting on the sidelines, the expense in raising, and the two negative levels aren't penalty enough". Is making him fall further behind the group, really a positive response to this issue?
Can't someone come up with a different meme altogether for answering this question?
Thread with this approach carefully, because it can very easily lead to the following response:
"Screw it... just bury him here and I'll make another character."
So, you are okay with dying just resulting in loosing some gold? How meaningful for a engaging narrative is that?
Its basically on the same level of impact as getting a sword sundered.
Salve of the second chance is a nice, cheap magic item that brings you back to life...
Just have the baddie that killed the guy have it as part of loot.
Actually the sword cost more. Still, how the heroes dieing in a mock battle is narrative engaging?
As a GM on separate occasions I have brought back two characters via npc spell casters, both characters had died heroically, both players said afterwards that they couldn't reconnect with the characters as they both felt that the character deaths were significant to the story.
I think it has something to do with timing... The quicker you bring back a character the less time the player has to start planning and getting excited about the character concept they just thought of.
So, you are okay with dying just resulting in loosing some gold? How meaningful for a engaging narrative is that?
Its basically on the same level of impact as getting a sword sundered.
Batman charges valiantly into the Joker's hideout. A dozen thugs leap up from their chairs and charge into battle, some of them shooting guns, others swinging bats and chains and crowbars. In the middle of the fight, the Joker drops into the room and starts attacking Batman with acid-squirting lapel flowers.
It's nothing batman can't handle. Dodging bullets and streams of acid, he knocks out the thugs one by one, each slumping unconscious to the floor, then he leaps into battle with the Joker himself. The Joker uses every trick up his sleeve, but Batman gets up close and personal and knocks him out.
The battle is over, time to call Gordon to send a paddy wagon.
But wait, one thug, a nobody, just a goon working for the Joker, he's not quite unconscious! Batman sees him and darts across the room to subdue him, but the goon gets off one shot. 20... 20... 20...
Batman's head explodes as the .44 hollow point rips through his left eye and the Joker's lair is suddenly splatter with bat brains.
The caped crusader is dead. He wasn't killed by an arch-enemy. No, the Joker lies unconscious on the floor. Instead our intrepid hero was killed by a goon. A thug. A mook. A nobody.
End of story.
How meaningful and engaging is that narrative? There was no epic battle with an arch-enemy. The ultimate villain of the piece didn't take his toll or get his final revenge. It was just lucky shot by a no-named underling whose only part of this story was to be a speed bump.
That's not narrative. That's not engaging.
Making the PLAYER sit around for hours while the other players go on a quest to revive his character is also not engaging. In fact, it's the exact opposite of engaging.
If, if, IF the death was engaging and narratively-fulfilling (not just a triple-20 by a mook after the battle is over), you point might make sense: the PC gave his all, even gave his life, to save the maiden fair, now the survivors quest to restore the fallen martyr to his former self. Fine.
But for this?
Bah!
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1st:
We have a house-rule to make PC-Death more memorable and meaningful, then just paying of the You-died-Fee at the next temple / magic shop.
I've noticed that every time someone opens with this theme, it finishes with a variation of ..."Penalise the player even more for dying, since the time sitting on the sidelines, the expense in raising, and the two negative levels aren't penalty enough". Is making him fall further behind the group, really a positive response to this issue?
Can't someone come up with a different meme altogether for answering this question?
Thread with this approach carefully, because it can very easily lead to the following response:
"Screw it... just bury him here and I'll make another character."
So, you are okay with dying just resulting in loosing some gold? How meaningful for a engaging narrative is that?
Its basically on the same level of impact as getting a sword sundered.
Seemed to work for DBZ.
No, but seriously, authors have the luxury of not having to deal with unlucky rolling. Death is cheap may not be the most epic thing in the world, but neither is Lancelot getting killed by random mook 218, especially if Lancelot ' player now has to sit out an hour.
And please note, I say this as a player who tends to use character death as an opportunity to try out new character concepts unless the GM tells me that it would be harmful to the story.
I like The Alexandrian death houserules. You don't immediately go unconscious until you're below your negative max hitpoint value. Healing spells work no matter how many negative hitpoints you have. You're not permadead until you've been past your death threshold for 24 hours.