(Edit = TL:DR - Would Pharasma reward a Skeleton worshiper with Resurrection as a reward for completing a great task and willingly surrendering his undeath after completing his purpose?)
So... This is going to sound weird, but I've recently had dreams involving one of my character concepts that has left me with several questions. Specifically regarding the lore of Pharasma and unwilling undead in the Pathfinder setting. While I understand that Pharasma detests undead using their condition to prolong their life, and has what is best described as disgusted pity towards undead for existing if they're unwilling, would that prevent her from rewarding action done by an individual undead that aided in bringing back the balance of life and death?
Long story short, my dreams are almost never about myself and are always story-like in nature. As if someone were reading me a book or watching a TV show, rather than what normal dreams are like. This dream was focused on a Skeleton "Paladin" (Summoner Archetype Paladin that summons his soul to fight with him). He lost almost all his memories from his mortal life with hazy recollections.
Ultimately, he hates his undead affliction and is disgusted by himself. But something in the back of his mind is preventing him from 'just ending it'. Ultimately he worships Pharasma, but he knows there is something he has to do before judgement. At the end of his journey, he learns that he was tasked with fighting an undead lich that wished to curse the world with undeath to prevent any souls from passing on in a perpetual state of stagnation. The party was eventually able to defeat the BBEG and call upon the goddess of death for judgement.
During the last moments of the dream, there was a conversation between the goddess and the skeleton paladin. She admitted that, while she was disgusted by his affliction it didn't change that he fulfilled his duties in her name and praised him for his convictions. She then conjured a well of positive energy and instructed him to walk into it. She told him "Now that your task binding you to your undeath has been completed, you have no reason to continue living as you are now."
He paused for a moment to say his goodbyes to his companions before walking into the well of positive energy. He didn't feel pain, didn't feel destruction, he only felt warmth wash over him as his undeath ended.
But instead of dying, his soul and body were merged back together and flesh regenerated. The light from the positive energy faded away and he stood, fully revived and no longer undead. He questioned the goddess way and for what purpose, and she admitted that this was his reward for completing his duties and willingness to surrender his undeath without resistance. "What is the lifetime of a mortal but a blink of an eye for a god? Live your second chance at life to it's fullest, for there will not be a third." She warned him before leaving.
My question is: Is this something Pharasma would actually do for an Undead who prevented a scourge of undeath from occurring across the world and willingly surrendering his undeath at the end of the journey?
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At the risk of giving the most obvious non-answer, what your table's Pharasma does is up your group, and if it makes a good story, most things are permissible even if they have to lean on the lore a bit to make it happen. Now, that disclaimer aside, this is a really cool concept for a character arc. If you were around when Book of the Dead came out, you may already know how many people immediately wanted to play against type by rolling up an undead worshipper of Pharasma.
For my money, a deity resurrecting a follower as a part of an epic story line where the character sacrificed themselves for their faith seems entirely plausible, so the fact that the character was undead seems perfectly in line. As for Pharasma personally, since she already intentionally holds souls back who she knows will be resurrected, and thus knows the 'time' of any given soul, it's not beyond reason that she simply knows this worshipper's time is not up and so resurrects them rather than accept their soul then and there.
On the other hand, the harder explanation to me would be why she provides Champion powers to an undead worshipper for the duration of the adventure, but if you can square that away with fate, everything else seems acceptable.
To maybe build onto this idea a bit, there is one other option you could roll with for the big finisher: Individuals who died doing some great service for the Boneyard and cycles of souls are sometimes offered the opportunity to be reborn as a Duskwalker. Especially if you're aiming for an 'after-game' epilogue scenario, the character coming back as a child duskwalker a few years later might be even more satisfying than just coming back to life. That'll be your call though.
@Sibelius Eos Owm: Nah, this was just a dream. No campaign sadly. I'm tempted to do some writing with this ideas as a pet project, hence my asking if my dream would be plausible with the disposition of Pharasma. Though I do have a character build for this character in case anyone does want to use them. I could definitely see them being a Duskwalker rather than restored into a human.
@Perpdepog: I'd argue that Duskwalker's "Neither your body nor your spirit can ever become undead" would conflict with a Skeleton <body> Summoner with his own Soul <spirit> as his Eidolon.
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Hello MonkeyFish -
What a lovely design for a character, both mechanically and spiritually.
Your concept is entirely practicable in Pathfinder Society, where a recent adventure introduced a whole village of good-aligned skeleton survivors of Last Wall. They are all ordinary folks who came back as undead but were able to retain their essential humanity. A pharasmite champion who died there would have come back and still been able to keep serving their goddess. Unfortunately, unless you've been playing a lot of PF2 PFS, you won't have the acheivement points (ACP) for a skeleton boon for quite a while. It is the most expensive ACP ancestry in PFS.
As a duskwalker player, I could see a skeleton who does great service to Pharasma being rewarded by becoming a duskwalker 'child.' Though lore-wise, all duskwalkers are born as adults. My elven duskwalker, Tess, is now 6 months old and still surprised - and delighted - by all the crazy things her fellow mortals do. Indeed that is what I assume your character would become, because duskwalkers are created for special souls whose mortal life had been cut too short.
Basically a duskwalker can never become undead, but there is nothing to say that a resurrected skeleton couldn't become a duskwalker. Your eidolon would have to be 'reborn' at the same time though. I will also note that there is in official lore even a psychopomp parole officer, Tosof*, who deals with Pharasma's special exemptions. Tosof serves as parole officer for several immortal mortals and other corner cases. Tosof would be most interested in your character, I think.
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Yet another undead follower of Pharasma?
That's all well and good, but it is hardly a unique idea anymore.
Frankly, this is starting to get near the level of Drizzt clones!
Does Pharasma have more undead followers than living ones? If the small sample size that are these boards are to be believed, she very well may! XD
@Hilary Moon Murphy: Yeah, I've already got the build all planned out for Pathfinder Society, albeit less story driven and more mechanically focused than my dream version. I'd also have to pick a non Amnesia background for the build. (The Society character isn't going to be a Pharasma Champion since mechanically he needs to be Lawful Good, lol). Just need 50 more points to build him.
Unfortunately I also have another super expensive character I want to buy... (Kitsune Reflection Heritage Mirror Thaumaturge). So when the time comes, I'll have to choose which one I want to play more...
Regarding the Dream story itself, I definitely think that'd make a better ending for than just being resurrected. Perhaps when he becomes a Duskwalker reborn, his Eidolon also changes to a Psychopomp? Since originally his own soul was his Eidolon, being reborn would essensially give him a vacancy that could be filled by his new "patrol officer". Lol
@Bein Brennil: It's a common trope for intelligent undead to worship a death God/dess. Just writing the base summary of my dream, confirming if it was plausable before committing to a small story. I'd hate to waste time writing something only to learn it couldn't work canonically.
I do admit, Jaethal is becoming the new Drizt. Lol
(Edit) Inb4 a partition to make Pharasma pity unwilling undeath instead of be disgusted by it, and allow intelligent undead followers that follow fate as long as they don't seek to make their undeath a permanent thing? Lmao xD
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As a duskwalker player, I could see a skeleton who does great service to Pharasma being rewarded by becoming a duskwalker 'child.' Though lore-wise, all duskwalkers are born as adults.
Hmm, I was under the impression that duskwalkers appear usually in graveyards as older children. Like, not toddlers but also not fully adults; somewhere in the early teens maybe? I used to think they reincarnated as full adults roughly as they were before dying, but discovered that they grew into their new life some a little bit ago.
Yet another undead follower of Pharasma?
That's all well and good, but it is hardly a unique idea
I seem to be missing the point of this statement. Surely we are aware that nothing is original? That an interesting idea is still interesting no matter many other people have done it, especially if this is the first time someone else has tried it?
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Surely we are aware that nothing is original? That an interesting idea is still interesting no matter many other people have done it, especially if this is the first time someone else has tried it?
In a world where nothing is original, there is still the notion of "original enough." Otherwise, the word "original" would not exist or have any meaning at all.
Interesting ideas that become prolifically commonplace typically cease to be interesting.
That being said, TheMonkeyFish does have some interesting aspects to their idea that I've not seen before.
It's the core of the concept, an undead Pharasma worshipper, that I find unoriginal. TheMonkeyFish has added additional details that does make the character interesting in spite of this.