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Did anyone else make special arrangements to make resurrection easier for their group? Here's what I did:
We had an unfortunate death in book 4 (the ankou shadow doubles body-blocked the ranger) and the player seemed inconsolable and really wanted the character back. The convenient thing was that the player also wouldn't be able to attend sessions for a while so we organised a few mini sessions for the rest of the players.
The basic structure we used was the Research Subsystem. The way it works is there are various places of knowledge (called "libraries" in the subsystem) and interacting with them (usually requires a skill check) gives you points. The more points you collect, the easier it gets. Each place of knowledge might have its own quirks and restrictions. When you achieve certain point thresholds you get a benefit, like a sudden realisation about what to do or even some unexpected extra.
For Absalom I chose the following "libraries":
- • Arcanamirium (complication: PCs found the dean annoying and had to stealth to avoid her)
- • Forae Logos
- • College of Mysteries (complication: requires payment)
- • Temple of the Shining Star
- • House of Healing (complication: need to talk to doctors to get info and they are busy)
- • Seventh Church of Iomedae (complication: traditionally only Iomedae worshippers are told the secrets)
- • Azari Palace (complication: the books aren't catalogued)
- • Ahnkamen estate (complication: only Eaters of Knowledge members may access)
Each place grants a maximum of 3 points. Each attempt takes at least 4 hours (half a day). The default DC was 30.
The thresholds I used were roughly as follows:
- 3: Learn the base Resurrect ritual (extras if applicable at location: healer's gel, firestarter pellets)
- 5: Learn that speeches made by friends of the dearly departed lower the DC. The more friends call on him the better. (extras if applicable at location: +1 point for a separate research towards the raise dead spell, staff of final rest, dawnlight)
- 7: Learn that decorations, sounds and smells that remind the dearly departed of their home, their homeland, their life lower the DC (extras if applicable at location: stumble upon instructions for another uncommon ritual, like commune or planar ally)
- 9: +1 point for a separate research towards the raise dead spell or something else important to the story
So what happened after that they arranged a speech from all the important people from his background, including the guy who set him free , the people who helped to his feet when he was poor, the colleague he had a fling with. They bought spices imported from the Mwangi Expanse where he came from and so on.
We also role-played him being a ghost for a bit, he encountered a lesser death (the same one the Twilight Four had called to deal with the Infector) who tried to send him to the Boneyard but he resisted. During the culmination of the ritual (which was a critical success) he briefly met Desna. All in all it was worthwhile and I don't think it trivialised the impact of character death.
They later re-used the same tricks to resurrect Harlo Doleen (which I initially thought would completely derail the plot but actually wasn't too difficult to deal with).