D&D 5E How to add new PCs mid quest?

[Ralif Redhammer]

"And that's how we ended up with the bartender in our adventuring group."

You find a tavern RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DUNGEON.

There's one person there, sitting next to the bartender.

'Hey, I'm looking for work. You hiring?'

 

[Lanefan]

Serious: This is something you should have considered while writing the adventure. How to introduce new characters & why in the 9 hells should the party insta-trust them?

Not so serious: Sadly, now, because of your lack of prep/imagination, your player just has to sit out until this quest wraps up. Well, I guess they could help you play monsters.
BTW, now you have to go & re-adjust all your encounters.

Or the party turns around, goes back to town, and does some recruiting...

Introducing brand-new-to-the-party characters while in the field has always been more or less of a headache.

Lan-"and I know I for one wouldn't be readjusting any encounters should they decide to press on"-efan

 

[Davelozzi]

"And that's how we ended up with the bartender in our adventuring group."

Every party needs one. Most important role after healer...come to think if it, it's really a toss up!


Sent from my iPhone using EN World mobile app

 

[Caliban]

You find a small crystal globe with the character imprisoned inside. They can free the character by smashing the globe. Or they can keep it as a curiosity, never releasing the character.

"C'mon guys! I wanna play, when are you going to let me out?"

"Hey, the sign said 'In case of emergency, break glass'. We haven't had an emergency yet."

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

They find him ball gagged and bound with the next group of monsters. Or they just run into him and for some reason he decides to throw in his fate with this lot of insane tomb robbers who are doing stuff no rational person would do. We don't spend much time worrying about it as it takes away from the dungon bashing.

 

[nswanson27]

I got a bit of an issue... one of my players lost his character in the middle of a quest (they are traveling to a dungeon where a supposed artifact is being held. The character died in the middle of the trip when they were ambushed). He wants to use a new characters, but I am out of ideas on how to make this new character join up with the party when they are currently on a secret mission...

Once I was in this position. I was bound and gagged (kidnapped). The party found me and cut me loose, and I joined them.

 

[randrak]

MORE INFORMATION:

The Party: The party was composed of three members. Two of them hated each other deeply. After one ambush from their nemesis, one of the died but was immediately resurrected by a wish they had kept from a previous adventure. The party member didn't want to be resurrected (it had been his second death and he started to believe that people should not be resurrected after death). I DM that a wish is capable of bringing back the dead, regardless their permission.
Angry, the party member that was brought back decides to leave the party and the quest as he cannot forgive them for ignoring his wishes of staying dead.

The Quest: The party needs to heal a friend of theirs. The only healer capable of the magic needed to heal her gave them a quest in return. They need to fetch an artifact of her god from a certain dungeon. The party was still traveling to the dungeon when their nemesis ambushed them. The dungeon is a long forgotten and abandoned place.

The New Guy: The new guy is a worshiper of the Raven Queen. His goal in life is to (aside from following the commandments of the Raven Queen) is to find the missing family of his best friend (who died).

 

[Caliban]

New guy was tracking down a clue about the missing family. It either led him to the same dungeon the PC's are going to, or he got spectacularly lost while following the clue.

They encounter each other wandering around. (Cue: "Greetings strangers...I notice you are lacking a [my class] in your group. We should join forces." "Excellent suggestion. Let's be best friends.")

Or one of them has an encounter with wandering monsters and the other comes upon the fight and come to their aid. (Cue: "Well excuse me, I THOUGHT you were the aggressor! How was I supposed to know the halfling women were bandits?")

 

[Satyrn]

He was always right there, hanging out with the party on all their adventures. He just hasn't had any spotlight time before now.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I got a bit of an issue... one of my players lost his character in the middle of a quest (they are traveling to a dungeon where a supposed artifact is being held. The character died in the middle of the trip when they were ambushed). He wants to use a new characters, but I am out of ideas on how to make this new character join up with the party when they are currently on a secret mission...

Take a pause from the current mission at an easily remembered point, like the end of a good tv episode. Next "episode" is a flashback that introduces the new character, who the characters met years or months ago. If the party hasn't known eachother that long, then have most of the group use one off characters that you can later use as NPCs if you want, or they can pick up if a character dies.

Do a shortish, one off adventure where the new character proves their worth, and their loyalty, to the PCs that are in the framing story (the part that isn't a flashback).

Then, the adventure ends, everyone parts ways for one reason or another, and the adventure after that, goes back to the mission, and introduces that old friend at a critical moment, which you've written to be very early in the "episode" perhaps the first scene.

Perhaps they are an agent of the person who gave them the mission, perhaps they are working for the enemy, but have just realized that they shouldn't be, perhaps they are an escaped captive, perhaps something completely else. Either way, don't use an IN that makes that player wait through half the session before being introduced.

I really need to finish my rules for letting a PC's death have Heroic Sacrifice benefits, and letting them "force ghost" on behalf of the remaining PCs, creating a feeling like in movies and shows where Wash dies, but it happens while he achieves truly incredible piloting, and gets the group through something they had essentially no chance of getting through.
In my system, the PC can then do things like reroll another PC's failed roll, cause a locked door to be unlocked instead, basically mess with timing and probablitily in a way that gives the other heroes that sense of "plot armor/hero's luck" that saves Indiana Jone's neck, and/or establish that the PC had given someone a piece of info, a tool, a trinket, whatever, that just happens to be what they need to get out alive/win the day.
In 5e, it would work with INspiration Dice, Advantage, and a limited pool of "auto-success because PLOT" tokens.