As a GM, I frown upon the party inheriting a dead PC's gear. I personally think that most PCs in a role-playing game probably have family and loved ones somewhere. Expecting that family to inherit their wealth makes sense from a role-playing perspective and it prevents the PCs from getting too far above their expected WBL (Wealth-by-Level) value.
While I don't care too much about WBL, I also know that ignoring it can have significant consequences when the PCs are way too powerful (too much stuff) or sadly underpowered (not enough stuff). So I try not to put too much time and energy into thinking about WBL but I also try not to get too far above or below it, either.
One way to ruin WBL is to have a game where everyone is about where they should be, then one PC dies. The rest of the vultures adventurers loot the dead guy and keep his stuff and now they are each 33% above their expected WBL. If a party of four has two characters die, the other two are suddenly 100% above WBL. The players of the dead PCs make new characters who show up with an appropriate amount of gear, and now we have two vastly over-WBL characters and two normal characters, and the party itself is 50% above WBL.
That could cause them to destroy encounters that should have been more challenging. For some players, mindlessly destroying encounter after encounter with no real challenge is fun. But many players like to be challenged, and those players think the challenge ADDS to the fun, so I like to keep things challenging for them. Escalating the monsters' CR to compensate for being above WBL just leads to more wealth and more escalation and even more wealth and even more escalation - it never ends.
So, for me, it's best to keep it where it belongs.
Back to the OP, having a will, especially one that takes the dead guy's stuff out of the party by willing it to NPCs somewhere, is a perfect solution. As a player, I absolutely honor that (even if only for metagame reasons, but I'll work it into my RP somehow), and as a GM I not only allow it, I highly encourage it.
I've seen it done and work before. As long as you're not trashing WBL there's no reason a gm wouldn't be fine with it. It's actually a really good idea.
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From what I've seen, it's usually the accepted practice that a new PC character, brought into the story, has as much wealth as was lost by the previous character. Thus, if you loot the dead corpse of your fellow dragonslayer, the next guy is a prisoner of the goblins/drow/doommonsters that has been stripped to his skivvies, and requires outfitting before he can help the party. Or if you bury your comrade at arms with effects or else give them away to his next of kin, the next guy is a royal duke of Sosuchforth, and has his own gear in tow.
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As a GM, I frown upon the party inheriting a dead PC's gear. I personally think that most PCs in a role-playing game probably have family and loved ones somewhere. Expecting that family to inherit their wealth makes sense from a role-playing perspective and it prevents the PCs from getting too far above their expected WBL (Wealth-by-Level) value.
In my campaign, we fixed this by giving a new character starting wealth equal to that of the dead PC's level minus N.
N:= number of times the player brought a new character, not including the initial character.
Example 1, 9th level PC dies, and player wants to bring a new 9th level character, he uses gear for 8th level character. 9-1=8
Example 2, 9th level PC dies, and player wants to *again* bring new 9th level character, he uses gear for 7th level character. 9-2=7
In essence, over time, it becomes a bit more effective to keep your existing character and pay for raise dead/restoration... and it deters certain players for being too flaky and using your campaign as a personal playtest without any regard to plot or what's making sense in terms of party composition...
PDK, that seems likely to result in an accelerating rate of character deaths as gear degrades far faster than the monetized costs. Past a certain threshold your system seems likely to force a player to keep playing that character. Sometimes a player adapts post mortem to the campaign in order to join the "not die club".
Out of curiosity, does this apply to characters created after the preceding PC was slain in such a fashion as to have been permanently slain? They'd take a hit through no fault of their own...
As a GM, I frown upon the party inheriting a dead PC's gear. I personally think that most PCs in a role-playing game probably have family and loved ones somewhere. Expecting that family to inherit their wealth makes sense from a role-playing perspective and it prevents the PCs from getting too far above their expected WBL (Wealth-by-Level) value.In my campaign, we fixed this by giving a new character starting wealth equal to that of the dead PC's level minus N.
N:= number of times the player brought a new character, not including the initial character.
The danger with this is that if the player keeps losing characters, it probably means one of two things (or both):
1. It's a deadly campaign and character deaths are fairly common.
2. He's a bad player whose characters ignore danger and do reckless (suicidal) things.
In both cases, reducing his gear to make him even weaker just means he's more susceptible to dying the next time. If he was 9th level and dies with full 9th level gear, then you make him play a 9th level guy with 8th level gear, and then with 7th level gear, it just means he is going to have a hard time being effective and he'll be much more likely to die than he was originally - and since that original character had 100% chance of dying (because it died), that means his weaker versions have more than 100% chance of dying.
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I don't see why it wouldn't apply. Unless the party wasn't able to recover gear from the permanently slain character (i.e. PC gets swallowed whole with all of his gear; then I think it's fine if the new 9th level PC comes with 9th level gear). The point is to prevent party overload with dead PC gear. One could even imagine some players dying on purpose to just gear up the party... some kind of limitations are required here, otherwise life is cheap so to speak and some players are never really attached to their actual character enough to even care. Those players are kinda problematic on multiple levels. A lot of fellow players at such tables get annoyed as there's a feeling of "this player is not even trying" to have his PC survive and throws tactics and precautions aside on some kind of kamikaze-styled bent that's not good for anything, including storytelling, roleplay, wealth control, enjoying the process of overcoming challenges, etc.
However, ask yourself this: wouldn't giving full level gear worth to a new PC dissuade a player from getting his PC resurrected? (let's assume his right thumb gets burped out of the creature that swallows him, enabling resurrection...)
i.e. PC gets swallowed whole with ALL gear... gets resurrected... now has no gear? I can see this as a REAL problem for high level characters, especially if the guy sitting next to him keeps coming up with new PCs every game that have FULL gear wealth... hmmm... see you in another thread... :)
I see your point, I think.
What I do: gear goes away with the permadeath save those rare items that are integral to the campaign (which are often artifacts in APs). Story-wise it winds up inherited or as part of the 'not gonna read this junk aloud' flavor-loot in a dragon's hoard somewhere. Mechanically, it means that someone's bad luck or bad chargen doesn't force them to keep dying due to the latter.
Some probably feel that this is "communist" (to use one of my player's own turn of phrase) or otherwise unfair, but it's the only method that keeps things reasonably equitable regardless of messy demises.
Edit: gear loss is another matter (destruction, sundering, oozes). I'd not let someone roll a new character if their current one gets nomm'd on by a black pudding and survives. That's what the bad guys' loot is for. :D
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In both cases, reducing his gear to make him even weaker just means he's more susceptible to dying the next time. If he was 9th level and dies with full 9th level gear, then you make him play a 9th level guy with 8th level gear, and then with 7th level gear, it just means he is going to have a hard time being effective and he'll be much more likely to die than he was originally - and since that original character had 100% chance of dying (because it died), that means his weaker versions have more than 100% chance of dying.
DM Blake, you forget to account for the rest of the party divvying up the 9th level dead guy's gear. You *have* to give less gear to the newcomer if you want this balanced. Or you *have* to houserule that dead PC gear ALL disappears (via Will, or some other metagame device). If you want to disregard such DM fiat, while retaining control on the campaign wealth, you then have to give less gear to new characters.
Assuming the dead 9th level guy's gear (46K) is sold for half (23K), allowing a new 9th level PC with 8th level gear (33K), is actually generous, as the party is up to 56K now (party wealth + 23K + 33K = party wealth + 56K; compared to party wealth + 46K if you allow a new 9th level guy with 9th level gear)
Are you suggesting party keeps dead guy's wealth (46K sold for half at 23K) and then takes in a new guy with 46K too? (i.e. party wealth + 23K + 46K = party wealth + 69K???)
Sorry but I think that would make dying the most lucrative thing a party can do...
I think my +56K compromise is sound, and story-wise it removes the need for unnecessary plot devices (such as a character's will, inheritances and such)
Of course, if a character, for story reasons, drafts an agreement with the party, as long as respected, I have less of a problem allowing a new character at full wealth (still have a bit of a problem though as this still leaves the door open to players who don't make an effort to keep their PCs alive...)
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as for PDK i would hate your system because i die due to my poor luck which would fail me on my attempt to save my own life rolls. why punish the death prone guy by making him use crappier and crappier gear?
you need to have a basic agreement, out of game, with your fellow players as to how death / gear is handled... if you play with people who don't really pull in together or don't really do teamwork or don't really play nice with each other, there's no amount of rules that will alter the game to your satisfaction...
DM Blake, you forget to account for the rest of the party divvying up the 9th level dead guy's gear.
You're right, I was assuming you weren't keeping the dead guy's gear. But now it's just WORSE:
Allowing a new 9th level PC with 8th level gear (33K), means that guy has just 33K. But the rest of the group has 9th level gear (46K) so the new guy is 13K behind the rest of the team.
But that apparently is not what you meant?
Instead, you meant Assuming the dead 9th level guy's gear (46K) is sold for half (23K) (but some of it might have been useful without selling it), so the three survivors now have about 54K. And the new guy still comes in with just 33K, so he's not just 13K behind everyone, he's really 21K behind everyone.
Then you suggested he might die again, so the party sells his stuff again and gets, let's say, 18K for it (they keep a few potions or a wand at normal price), divide it up, and now they're at 60K. But the new guy coming in with 7th level gear has only 24K, so now he's a full 36K behind the rest of the group.
How does this guy, who has proven his survival skills are weak, manage to not die again when everyone else in the group has 2.5x more wealth and gear than he has?
If the GM is giving them level appropriate encounters, but the 3 survivors already have 10th level gear even though they're only 9th level, they might have a bit of an easy time of it, but the guy with 7th level gear is just going to die again, or if he manages not to, it will be by hiding and being super cautious - obviously not this player's main play style (or he wouldn't have died so much).
Are you suggesting party keeps dead guy's wealth (46K sold for half at 23K) and then takes in a new guy with 46K too? (i.e. party wealth + 23K + 46K = party wealth + 69K???)
Sorry but I think that would make dying the most lucrative thing a party can do...
Of course I'm not suggesting that. If you read my first post, you would see that I'm in favor of the party keeping NONE of the dead PC's stuff.
And you are right, if you can keep the stuff, dying IS the most lucrative choice. I did that with a group of players, long ago (1st edition I think, when we didn't even have WBL charts). One of us died and the GM told him to make up a new character with the same amount of stuff as his old character. No problem, except we kept his old character's stuff. My friend and I talked about it between sessions and decided to see how far we could go. So we both managed to get our characters killed the next session, the survivors got our stuff and we got new characters with stuff equal to what we lost. We got the other two players in on it and they "accidentally" died so we got their stuff and they got new characters with the same amount of stuff (which, by now, was their original stuff PLUS the stuff of my character and my friend's character).
By this time we had a group of 4 characters who had the amount of stuff that would have been appropriate for 9 characters.
And we did it a few more times, too. The next time I died, having already the gear for TWO full characters (that all went to the survivors), my remade character matched the stuff of the dead one so I entered the game with enough gear for TWO full characters - one death brought two characters worth of gear into the group. And it kept getting worse.
The GM finally realized we were doing this on purpose, but by then, we had godlike wealth and easily ruined the rest of the dungeon we were in.
It was childish and stupid (but I was a child then so I have an excuse) and since then, I've never allowed PCs to keep the wealth of a dead PC or, when they do (for good reasons usually), I automatically reduce upcoming treasure rewards to compensate and bring the party back to approximate WBL standards.
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On another thread in the Advice section, one member posted that when a PC dies, and for whatever reason (i.e. not optimized enough, underpowered, etc.) the player wants a NEW character brought in, they keep the dead guy's wealth, but the new character comes in one or two levels lower than the APL, with gear appropriate for his/her level.
Yes this method requires a DM to keep tabs on XPs to eventually allow the newcomer to 'catch up' with the APL, but aside from that, I find it very sound and appealing... reasons: 1) characters brought back with raise dead have two permanent negative levels (about 7K cost total to bring back, raise dead + 2 restorations I believe); 2) provides some kind of incentive beyond wealth to NOT DIE (so as to prevent DM Blake-nesses like the one he did to his poor DM when he was young! LOL )
As a GM I'd certainly permit the idea of a will.
As players? Well, for the will to be of any use, players have to know about it. Even if you mean the best, the paladin needs to know about your rogue's will or she just might donate all your stuff to your god's temple. But if you liked the guy, you shouldn't belittle their effective last request.
Don't forget also that sometimes the dead PC's goods get used very immediately. 'Alex had the Sword of Slay Demons, and just got ripped into Alexbits by the demon's now dead human cohort. I know Alex wanted his stuff donated, but if we don't use that sword now--and his secret cache of Cure Lots of Wounds potions, too ... '
I wouldn't FORCE a will on characters, of course. 'Fine. My backstory is all my family are jerks, which is why I'm cleaning out dungeons. I will them three copper pieces because they'd demand a 50% cut on the pennies on my eyes. Everything else goes to the barbarian who gave more of a crap about me. So there.'
A question to any of you who say you don't allow the PCS to keep the dead guys stuff;
Where's the stuff go? And when?
Does it fade out of existance?
Is it now like Thors' hammer & none of the remaining pcs can lift it?
Are the pcs like video game characters & once all thier slots are full they can't add any more stuff?
In our evil game we had a player leave (slightly different situation) and his character and stuff were taken when our base was attacked by inquisitors.
When we switched GMs for a different game/series of modules, the new GM had his old character killed to set an example. All good stuff burned with him.
A question to any of you who say you don't allow the PCS to keep the dead guys stuff;
Where's the stuff go? And when?
Does it fade out of existance?
Is it now like Thors' hammer & none of the remaining pcs can lift it?
Are the pcs like video game characters & once all thier slots are full they can't add any more stuff?
Really? It was necessary to build three of the most ridiculous straw men you could think of?
This is a thread about a PC having a will. You know, so that all his worldly possessions would go to some NPC family somewhere. So his friends, honoring that will, make an effort to make that happen. They pick up his body and his stuff, haul it back to town, have the body buried, and have the priest that officiated the burial see to it that the will is executed properly. That could involve local legal stuff (courts, lawyers, etc.) or maybe not. Either way, the PCs are back to the dungeon, after stopping at a local tavern to recruit a replacement PC, and none of them have looted their fallen comrade - because maybe some PCs only desecrate dead enemies, but honor dead companions.
In a home game I can control how powerful he bad guys are. I can easily adjust anything so it is a challenge. My problem is when the PCs are vastly different in power levels.
Allowing you to comeback as another character means you would need to be over geared too.
But a simple solution is place encounters that take gear away. Have someone charge them in magical items, green slime eats their gear, they get robbed.
I honestly do not see much of a problem.
A question to any of you who say you don't allow the PCS to keep the dead guys stuff;
Where's the stuff go? And when?
Does it fade out of existance?
Is it now like Thors' hammer & none of the remaining pcs can lift it?
Are the pcs like video game characters & once all thier slots are full they can't add any more stuff?
We ussually bury it with the owner, viking style, unless there is some kind of artifact needed to complete the adventure (like, we wouldn't bury Frodo with the One Ring. But we would bury him with Dart and his magic Mithril Chainshirt).
I don't know why some other groups decide to steal their deceased brothers, but I guess that's what people call "table variance"
A question to any of you who say you don't allow the PCS to keep the dead guys stuff;
Where's the stuff go? And when?
Does it fade out of existance?
Is it now like Thors' hammer & none of the remaining pcs can lift it?
Are the pcs like video game characters & once all thier slots are full they can't add any more stuff?Really? It was necessary to build three of the most ridiculous straw men you could think of?
This is a thread about a PC having a will. You know, so that all his worldly possessions would go to some NPC family somewhere. So his friends, honoring that will, make an effort to make that happen. They pick up his body and his stuff, haul it back to town, have the body buried, and have the priest that officiated the burial see to it that the will is executed properly. That could involve local legal stuff (courts, lawyers, etc.) or maybe not. Either way, the PCs are back to the dungeon, after stopping at a local tavern to recruit a replacement PC, and none of them have looted their fallen comrade - because maybe some PCs only desecrate dead enemies, but honor dead companions.
Wether or not you get the humor in there, it's still a serious question.
In my experience most non-reversable deaths that would trigger a will (leave pc gear behind) occur far from home &, most importantly, with the adventure still in progress.
Wether the party intends to honor the will once home doesn't matter. Right then they have access to + xxxxx worth of stuff.
Orher than some kind of code of honor, why wouldn't they be making use of it? Thus screwing with the challenge levels.
Now if that will was magical, & the gear just vanished, that'd solve the problem.
Might suck if the victim was brought back to life....
That's why they made Miracle instant PC with gear