I have no intention of being stingy with hero points, so permadeath isn’t going to be something I need to worry about because of one lucky die roll- so most PC deaths, when they happen, are going to be player choice.
As for NPCs, I’ve never been big on bringing them back except as undead, so...
I'm curious - why is the idea of resurrection magic any more or less fantastical than any other magic in the setting, in that it needs to be so much more rare or restricted?
Or is it actually just the unpleasant thought that you think players popping up again and again from death eliminates tension?
Can your players' party actually afford that? Why are you showering them in diamonds, etc?Is this a legit problem at tables or is it armchair math gone crazy?
It's got nothing to do with players (hence why I've already worked out a couple of ways to give PCs access to both forms) but about the setting. Most fantasy stories don't have person dying = go to the local priest and get a raise dead. The only one I can think of where death is that easily overcome is Wheel of Time: ** spoiler omitted **
So I don't think there's anything antagonistic about it towards players.
I think Kingdoms of Thorn and Bone also had it be fairly commonish once their big magic whatsits in the setting got moving, and were similarly ... icky.
Though that could be a fun thing to play with in a setting, actually. Totally reverse the rarity of the resurrection ritual, make it dirt common, but something the priesthood and devotees of the evilest evil god to ever evil have access to because their god's portfolio is death, or breaking causality or some such. They don't get exterminated as a religion because, well, kings and rich people and high-profile adventurers want to be brought back from the dead.
So the party can most definitely bring each other back as often as they like, it just costs them owing the bad guys a solid every time they do. Infernal contracts on tap.
Causality breaking sounds like a really fun way of handling resurrection.
Resurrection being widely available was something that set these games aside and provided for a really cool and interesting take on the world when reasonably applied. I for one am sorry to see it go.
Resurrection being widely available was something that set these games aside and provided for a really cool and interesting take on the world when reasonably applied. I for one am sorry to see it go.
It's still as rare (or uncommon, to be specific) as the individual GM wants it to be.
Having "how much of a revolving door death is" be up to the person running the game is in every way a good thing.
Resurrection being widely available was something that set these games aside and provided for a really cool and interesting take on the world when reasonably applied. I for one am sorry to see it go.
"Uncommon" puts the availability and the reasonableness in the GM's hands, where it likely belongs if they're writing the material (tuned to player interests naturally).
Mechanically, any class can perform Rituals, which opens up the option quite a lot to cultures & parties that may not have the spell power.So PF2 allows the pendulum to swing either way without tweaking Rules Idolators.
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I would argue it's actually pretty common, it just depends on how fantastical the setting is.
I think that might hinge upon what your definition of "fantastical" is. Certainly the big 3 fantasy settings of popular culture don't have the ability to walk down the street to Raise your Dead. Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings don't have Raising of the Dead-- their closest exceptions are closer to an angel and an undead not staying dead, which is pretty different.
Game of Thrones has a very small number of examples of Raising the Dead which are noted as unexplained whims of the gods, as compared to the tons of people that just stay dead. Which correlates pretty well to the magic being Uncommon or Rare, which is what most people here are talking about rather than removing said magic from their settings entirely.
You already mention comics as a big one (yes, it's a plot device every time, but it still happens every. time.)
The thing is, having it be a "unique" plot contrivance means that death is largely considered permanent by most of the people in the setting, even if it is permanent for very few characters. The 600 people in Stanford that the New Warriors got killed fighting Nitro stayed dead, which drives the story forward for Tony Stark in a way that it wouldn't if he could just donate money to bring them back to life.
Also, the fact that death doesn't stick in comics is usually derided as a failing due to the nature of the medium, not a feature people are happy about.
Anime and manga is another, where resurrection is relatively common with the mentioned example of Dragon Ball simply being the most egregious (and Dragon Ball absolutely does get to the point where it's so easy it's handled offstage as an afterthought.)
Dragonball is also a story about the most powerful beings in existence that destroy planets from indigestion. Even Pathfinder doesn't aspire to that level of power. (Unless "fantastical" means "high powered" by your definition?) There are also plenty of animes where dead stays dead, including some pretty out there ones.
Also, the thing with the dragonballs is that they are still fairly unique artifacts that very few people seem to be aware of. Goku's pals basically have a monopoly on them and the resources to instantly assemble them once a year. It is, if you will, a Rare spell they have obtained.
That's still different from death being something you can just casually reverse with enough money and a big enough settlement. If my husband gets run over by a car on Dragonball Earth, I probably can't bring him back as some random schmuck. But if our nation gets wiped off the map by the villain of the week, then the heroes will probably restore us.
About the same.
I’ve always run Raise Dead as a kind of ritual, and will continue to do so. Likely, only NPCs, unless there is a particular storyline that it makes sense for PCs to learn the ritual
Resurrection is practically unheard of, and will likely remain that way unless there us a good story reason for it
To come up.
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I think having a higher risk of permadeath will only increase the incentive for rocket tag. Which thankfully PF2 has reduced.
Is death really that much of a revolving door in PF1? I do not remember PCs not even caring about being killed when exploring dungeons.
And I think it interesting that GMs seem to not care that much about characters drastically reducing the odds of dying through spending huge amounts of money yet try to push back magically coming back from death as much as possible.
In the end, it's all about the stories you want to tell. But it makes one more thing to be debated between GM and players before the game starts. Which might end up being a drawback of the rarity system.
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In the end, it's all about the stories you want to tell.
This is where it starts. Everything else falls out of that. As far as I am concerned it has little to nothing to do with rule sets, or specific rules.
This is where the discussion begins. This is usually an interesting, creative, and fun discussion. Quite frankly there isn't a campaign, unless there is this discussion.
It is almost laughable if it wasn't so sad, that the second it is articulated that RPG GMs have a certain set of responsibilities and the tools to fulfill those responsibilities, then the discussion becomes a "debate."
It really does makes me wonder what people have been playing. Thankfully, one of the beautiful things about RPGs is that we can all make it what we want.
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In the end, it's all about the stories you want to tell. But it makes one more thing to be debated between GM and players before the game starts. Which might end up being a drawback of the rarity system.
You think having a talking with the gm before a game starts to set expectations is a bad thing O.o... okay.
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Make 'em come back evil and all jacked-up like in Pet Sematary. Or just make it rare or maybe even make them lose their memories. There have to be some sort of stakes or the game will be boring. If you can just get brought back later, there's nothing really to lose and that gets old really fast.
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Make 'em come back evil and all jacked-up like in Pet Sematary. Or just make it rare or maybe even make them lose their memories. There have to be some sort of stakes or the game will be boring. If you can just get brought back later, there's nothing really to lose and that gets old really fast.
Out of curiosity, isn't coming back all evil and jacked up somewhat covered by the critical failure result of resurrect?
I don't have any problem with raise dead being common, mostly because
A. The spell only functions at the GM's discretion.
B. The spell requires a mostly intact body. (In other words: a second level of DM discretion).
C. Has a high material cost.
D. Inflicts "clumsy 2, drained 2, and enfeebled 2 for 1 week" on the one being raised, which means that if you're playing in a time crunch campaign, you may be better off just making a new character.
Given how limited the spell is, I don't really see it as much of a problem. Resurrection on the other hand, I would likely relegate to uncommon.
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I'm curious - why is the idea of resurrection magic any more or less fantastical than any other magic in the setting, in that it needs to be so much more rare or restricted?
Or is it actually just the unpleasant thought that you think players popping up again and again from death eliminates tension?
Can your players' party actually afford that? Why are you showering them in diamonds, etc?Is this a legit problem at tables or is it armchair math gone crazy?
To be fair, unless someone posting here has tried both ways - Raising magic is Common vs. Raising magic is Rare - it is by definition "armchair".
That said, perhaps the existence and proliferation of this thread is proof to the validity of the claim it implicitly pupports?
Perhaps not in your games - perhaps so but you haven't noticed?
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You think having a talking with the gm before a game starts to set expectations is a bad thing O.o... okay.
In the end, it's all about the stories you want to tell. But it makes one more thing to be debated between GM and players before the game starts. Which might end up being a drawback of the rarity system.
No. I don't.
However having to detail your stance on potentially every Rare and Uncommon element of the game seems daunting.
Whereas previously I only needed to detail how my setting diverts from the norm and what I think of unusual elements that my players will want for their characters.
Not to mention published adventures I might want to co-opt for my game and where I will need to check what the rarity assumptions are.