Campaign help

[Timdog]

Hey guys,

I'm DMing a campaign, I'm quite new at it and I have an idea for something but I'm struggling with how to implement it.

I'm doing a curse of the azure bonds theme, for those not in the know essentially they party wakes up with missing memories and has 5 azure magic tattoos on their body, and they are from 5 evil parties and lets said 5 evil parties take control of them whenever they want (NOT a mechanic I will use to much, but incentive for the party to want to get it fixed :))

one aspect of these bonds I want to put in is that they protect the user - none of the 5 want the puppets to die, even at the expense of the other 4 evil parties.

The idea behind this is to give the players a "get out of dead" free card so I can throw really stupid stuff like a behold at them and not worry about a bad fort save killing someone off forever.

Where I'm struggling is a penalty for the players so they don't learn to abuse the system. I have two thoughts in mind:
a) the process that saves them is constitution driven and it drains constitution ever time it activates, so abusing it will literally kill the players or
b) the process needs gold (or magic items) to work and everytime it works it drains an item and/or deletes a bunch of their gold.

The problem I'm having is balance. For instance, say they are in a fight and one of them dies. If I use the bonds to automatically save them, and then apply said penalty, who's to say they can't argue that they were fine with dying and would have preferred for me to let them die so the party could raise them after the fight without the negatives? Same goes with stuff like being paralyzed (by a dracolich for example) - if I use the bonds to free them from that "permanent" paralysis, they could argue that they would have won the fight without that paralyzed person and thus shouldn't have penalties, and I can't really argue that.

Any thoughts on how to decide when to apply said penalties? Or is it just flat out a bad idea and I should let it go?

The party is a REALLY strong level 5 (they are currently waltzing through a CR11 encounter with no real threat of death!) so I have to throw some pretty bad ass shit at them, BUT I want the "get out of dead card" built in incase i'm too successful at actually killing them lol.

[SmiloDan]

Maybe give the PCs a way to resist the commands of their "5 evil masters," and then give them a penalty to the mechanic that allows them to resist it.

For example, if they have to make a DC 25 Will save to resist being controlled, each time they "die," they get a cumulative -1 penalty to their Will save.

And you can also have the evil masters exert control when a PC is dead or paralyzed because the evil masters don't want to lose their dolls.

[Timdog]

Ooo, nice thought, I didn't think about the evil guys taking control on paralyzation or death as a way to not lose their toys, exactly the sort of idea's I'm looking for.

Any more ideas on how to "charge" when I save them from death, or just leave it at "the bad guys control you for a bit"?

[SmiloDan]

Let me think....

Azure Bonds is my all time favorite D&D book, so I've read it over a dozen times.

WWAD?

Maybe get all emotional? Like when Alias went on a crying jag at the Hidden Lady after the wedding fiasco? Or maybe the PC will have a weird dream that gives the evil masters information, like in the burned out shell of an inn before the kalmari or whatever attacked.

[DalmarWolf]

I would just have it take a lot of time to recover. Once you're out it takes a day to a week before you return. Maybe you heal slow afterwards or magic healing doesn't work on you for a while. And maybe the evil has an easier time of taking over in the period.

[Timdog]

Thanks guys.

Anyone else?

[Timdog]

SmiloDan, did you ever play the computer game? I'm more basing it on that - hints to the original story abound (they'll meet all main players from the novel which yes, is one of my favorties for "brain candy".

[SmiloDan]

Nope, just read the novels.