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Okay, I looked again at Forest of Spirits, and there are several of the enemies in the module who, in the morale section, are described as "performing a self-inflicted coup de grace with a dagger" when close to death. See, for example, the character on pages 36-37. While it doesn't specify how hard this is, the impression I get from reading it is that they're supposed to just pull out a dagger slice themselves all in one action.
Of course, these are enemies, so you can argue they don't follow PC rules, but still, it seems to suggest it's possible to do.
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Just to add a data point, there is a PFS scenario with a self-inflicted CdG. I think it was actually what was referred to in the first reference to precedents way up there somewhere.
Edit: It was bugging me, the reference was made by Serisan in one of the first couple posts.
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OK, I've given this a lot more thought than I really think I should have... and perhaps it is out of place on the Rules Forum, being just my opinion... but here goes...
(IMHO)I can see this as being a very dramatic moment. A long time ago in a time called 3.0 in a game called LG I can remember running a druid. A guard dog my PC owned (not an AC, just a guard dog) had been hit by a nasty Undead creature called a Son of K something (I don't remember the exact name, but a nasty creature that had worms that crawled off it and infected living creatures.) The dog got hit and was down dying and there was no way to heal it. Unsure if it would raise as some undead spawn, my druid killed it. Held him in his arms and killed him with a dagger. And I cried on the way home in the car that night. Had to stop and park and have a good tear session. I still remember that game (15 years later?). It was just a silly fictional dog, and it still brings tears to my eyes. Hell of a game. Unforgettable, even now years later.
I can see times when the PC might want/need to do this. (not just the circumstances described by the OP). I can see a PC looking at being changed to an Undead with one more hit, deciding to rob the monster of it's chance to spawn. Heck, 'twould be a death the bards would sing about. A chance few of us get.
In combat real people jump on grenades - to save their buddies. There are many examples of choosing death by one's own hand in battle. We should remember that in WWII the Japanese forces had more Kamikaze volunteer pilots (these would be semi-elite troops to be trained as pilots) than they had planes available. Commanders talked about the hard choice of deciding who NOT to allow to fly those mission, who had to stay home 'cause they didn't have the planes.
In this game of ours, the Player controls the actions of his PC. Sometimes I may not like what my Players decide - but IMHO, I would be less of a Judge to tell him "you can't decide to do this... ah, roll a will save to see if you have the nerve." Crud - having the nerve is often what being Heroic is all about. "Sorry, you can't be a Hero today, you rolled a '4'". I'm not going to do this to the paladin player who decides to cover his comrades retreat and by them a little escape time with his life.
Do I know why the player wanted to have his PC kill himself? No. But I think it would be bad for the Judge to deprive him of this option.
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Ha ha! I will show you!
//slashes left arm with knife
eh? damn blade! I know, let me show you this magic trick and make the knife disappear!
with apologies to Heath Ledger.
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I think this is covered by the "Don't be a dick" clause of the game. The problem here isn't the character committing suicide. It's getting everyone else killed on purpose in the process.Here's the thing, you say suicide is allowed in the game.
So your party is exploring the dungeon. And your CN rogue goes through the dungeon quickly, trying aggro every mob at once. Then they suicide, leaving the remaining party members to fight the entire dungeon at once. And now the GM has to rescue the party, or allow the TPK to happen.
I would be opposed to allowing intentional, non-productive suicide in my games (productive suicide would be being a martyr when it was needed to save the rest of the party). If a player doesn't want to continue, they don't have to come to the session.
If you want to play a semi-suicidal character concept, I don't mind that, and there are even some neat build options there. That said, I am strongly opposed to players that purposely suicide after I figure in the CR of encounters based on a full party of living PCs.
I suppose if the player just wanted to play a character concept where the character died in every session, that could be fun, but only if I, the GM, was notified ahead of time.
While I do agree that getting everyone killed on purpose is an issue, the suicide did not have to be done.
Rather than suicidal, a brash CN rogue could attempt gather all the enemies in the dungeon so the party could beat them all at once, thus saving time and making the adventure more efficent (stupid and foolish, but good intentions). And if the end result was that everone died, I'll admit, I would treat it differently than I would the above example of a suicidal PC, even though the end result was the same.
I think suicidal PCs are somewhat against the very concept of Adventurers. I don't really see any issues with NPCs committing suicide. But as they are controlled by the GM, we don't really need rules for them to accomplish this.
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Order of the Stick also noted that if a character is killed it's a good way to protect their secrets as you get cool saves against Speaking with Dead and you're immune to resurrection if you don't want to come back.
http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0542.html
542 + 543
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Here's the thing, you say suicide is allowed in the game.
So your party is exploring the dungeon. And your CN rogue goes through the dungeon quickly, trying aggro every mob at once. Then they suicide, leaving the remaining party members to fight the entire dungeon at once. And now the GM has to rescue the party, or allow the TPK to happen.
If this was PFS, I'd probably dequeue the table and eject the player responsible, than continue the game if the remaining players are up to it.
Here's the thing, you say suicide is allowed in the game.
So your party is exploring the dungeon. And your CN rogue goes through the dungeon quickly, trying aggro every mob at once. Then they suicide, leaving the remaining party members to fight the entire dungeon at once. And now the GM has to rescue the party, or allow the TPK to happen.
... does anyone really think this is likely to be much of a problem?
I was in a non-PFS game once where we were exploring a tomb, at maybe 2nd level. We had encountered a library, and the wizard was looking for scrolls. So the rogue player got bored. Plus, apparently, he thinks rogues should go off periodically in order to steal things and not have to share them with the party.
So he went off on his own, not trying to aggro things, just trying to find secret doors & loot. Except, of course, he woke a Wraith. It's been a few years, but I still remember the in-game image of him coming pounding back down the corridor toward us, with a Wraith behind him. My thought was, "If you were going to keep all the treasure, maybe you should keep the whole monster, too!"
So apparently there are people out there who think that rogues should think this way. I've been privileged, I guess, but I hadn't played with rogue players like that before, and I'd just as soon not do so again. They certainly don't need to to play a good rogue!
I like the comment I've seen here to GMs about how to handle a situation like this when a player sends his character haring off, splitting the party. "Nothing happens." ... "Okay, you explore a lot of empty corridors." ... "You find nothing." You'd think it would end that kind of idiotic behavior pretty quickly.
Failing that: "You wake a Wraith. You turn to the door and it has locked behind you." ... "Your Disable Device will fail; don't even bother rolling it."
Letting the rogue aggro everything solo was something only a hapless GM would do!
{EtA: Maybe in organized play, in particular, GMs don't have these options. Although when I look up "hapless," it says it means "unfortunate" -- and yes, that's apt.}
Scooby Doo = death, let him learn the lesson the hard way.
As for DD failing, it takes time. That is long enough for a Wraith to mess him up good.
Also note: most incorporeal creatures can keep pace with him and hurt him all along the way.
Someone might have already said this but isn't this just committing Sepoku?
Someone might have already said this but isn't this just committing Sepoku?
You are not worthy of the honour of seppuku.
Pretty much though, sorry guys- CDG'ing yourself is a special ability of the samurai class. Looks like you'll have to take a dip.
http://www.archivesofnethys.com/MonsterDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Salikotal
Another source of implication that it's possible to CdG oneself. Sure, it could be a specific exemption, but unlike the action time, it doesn't specify ignoring the "must be helpless" restriction, and imo that kinda implies that it's common sense enough to not have to be specified that you can choose to be helpless for the purpose of self-targeting.
The Seraptis Demon is another one. This is what the Lords of Chaos writeup has:
Gaze of Despair (Su) A seraptis’s gaze fills the minds of
those within 30 feet with overwhelming and soul-crushing
despair. Anyone who fails a DC 22 Will save upon being
exposed to a seraptis’s gaze immediately takes 1d6 points
of Charisma drain and is staggered for 1d6 rounds. If
the Charisma drain would normally reduce a creature’s
Charisma to 0, that creature instead succumbs to
overwhelming suicidal urges and attempts to end its life
by the most convenient method at hand, subject to GM
discretion. (In most cases, this effect causes a creature
to make a coup de grace attempt on itself, but if a more
dramatic method of self-destruction is available, the
creature takes that action.) Once a creature reaches this
suicidal state of despair, it remains in that state until its
Charisma score is restored to its normal maximum—if
methods of restoring lost Charisma are not available, the
suicidal victim must be restrained at all times to prevent
attempts to kill itself. This is a mind-affecting effect. The
save DC is Charisma-based.
Someone might have already said this but isn't this just committing Sepoku?
It's been said, and do you know how hard it is to comit seppuku? (hint that's why they need a kaishaku to behead them before they can lose face)
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What? No it doesn't, it sounds like something idiotic a horrible jerk would do.... does anyone really think this is likely to be much of a problem?That does actually sound like something a rogue would do....
That would be just about every CN character I've played with. That alignment is for horrible jerks, almost exclusively. They like it because they can basically do anything within that alignment and claim it qualifies as RPing their character well - they're not wrong in this respect, provided they remain consistently inconsistent about it.
And I'm talking about non-PFS groups.
In PFS, this sort of thing isn't allowed, mostly because characters are forced to play the senario and have little time for other types of role play. I'm not critizing it, just pointing it out. It's also very easy to eject PFS players from a game, since their absence won't affect your overall campaign.
For non-PFS, I had a session my PCs were given the freedom to go any shop in a very large city. They decided they wanted to go a Cosplay shop. As GM, I couldn't see a balance issue here, so we went. I even managed to use an NPC salesman to convince one of the players that a cosplay weapon was real enough to attempt to use in the next combat. We had fun with this one. PFS can't really do this sort of thing (GMs creating areas and NPCs on the whims of the players isn't allowed in PFS).
And players creating exploits within the rules of a game is one of the cornerstones of why games like pathfinder are so fun. I don't think suicide should be allowed for players, at least not in the coup de grace capacity. If they really want their character to die, they can go drown themselves.
Oh, and as for exploits, there is a kinetists feat that allows a dead character to explode when they die.
Okay, I looked again at Forest of Spirits, and there are several of the enemies in the module who, in the morale section, are described as "performing a self-inflicted coup de grace with a dagger" when close to death. See, for example, the character on pages 36-37. While it doesn't specify how hard this is, the impression I get from reading it is that they're supposed to just pull out a dagger slice themselves all in one action.
Of course, these are enemies, so you can argue they don't follow PC rules, but still, it seems to suggest it's possible to do.
There are players and judges, perhaps who insist on skill checks to tie shoelaces. More sane folks realize that you don't always have to complicate the game with additional rules.
I might make a character who's not very disciplined make a will save DC 10 to go through with it, but others whose character types clearly are that hardened.. I'd go with it.
I guess that it is a good thing that the Confusion spell leaves your mind too muddled to coup de grace yourself properly.
I guess that it is a good thing that the Confusion spell leaves your mind too muddled to coup de grace yourself properly.
I generally interpret the 'attack yourself' option of confusion to be less attempted suicide and more "AAAAATHERE'SAGIANTSPIDERONMYARMKILLITKILLIT" *Whack arm with mace*.
I generally interpret the 'attack yourself' option of confusion to be less attempted suicide and more "AAAAATHERE'SAGIANTSPIDERONMYARMKILLITKILLIT" *Whack arm with mace*.I guess that it is a good thing that the Confusion spell leaves your mind too muddled to coup de grace yourself properly.
I've always thought it's how it works too.
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Someone might have already said this but isn't this just committing Sepoku?It's been said, and do you know how hard it is to comit seppuku? (hint that's why they need a kaishaku to behead them before they can lose face)
I always thoughts the helper for seppuku or jigai was to put an end to the suffering. Dying from stomach injuries could take days. The helper was to make sure death was almost instantaneous.
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You can coup-de-grace yourself.
I was in a PFS adventure, and when I went to explore the kitchen, it turned out to have an undead creature haunting it. The creature possessed me. I failed my Will Save, and I was told to make my Fort Save, then I was told my character coup-de-graced herself. I didn't die instantly because I made my Fort Save, but I did Crit myself, taking a whole lot of damage.
See, there's another one. I wouldn't allow possessed or dominated characters to be allowed to coup de grace themseleves. If a scenario, or specific ability/spell calls it out specifically as an option, I'd allow it as an exception.
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I always thoughts the helper for seppuku or jigai was to put an end to the suffering. Dying from stomach injuries could take days. The helper was to make sure death was almost instantaneous.Someone might have already said this but isn't this just committing Sepoku?It's been said, and do you know how hard it is to comit seppuku? (hint that's why they need a kaishaku to behead them before they can lose face)
Yes and no, seppuku is not just sticking yourself in the stomach, it's cutting youself horizontally in the lower belly, then up possibly to the sternum, normally, this cuts enough blood vessels that death is fairly quick to come, but you're not supposed to show pain, so the assistant is there to behead you before you lose face.