PC Death when the player isn't there

[rushlight]

This reminds me so much of the movie The Gamers where one of the players is missing ans his character just stands in the background of every scene looking off into the distance with his hands on his hips!

Anyway, this problem disappears once the wizard gets Teleport. Just beam the missing guy back home - *poof* problem solved. Any reason will do - he's lonely, missing his mom, wants to see his cousin, hungry for the steak at the Cowbell Inn - whatever.

 

[Psychic Warrior]

I am glad I'm not the only person who has had difficulty is resolving this kind of thing. I talked on the phone with the player in question and we reincarnated his character (we both rolled and i allowed him to take the more desireable result - he ended up as a gnome! The other choice was halfling. After I gave him some details on the gnomes of the Scarred Lands he seemed much happier and said this actually sounded very interesting. He's going to multiclass as a Druid now (the favoured class of gnomes in the SL) and wil be spending some time with the Druid who reincarnated him to possiblty gain enough experience points to go up a level (he's actually very close to regaining the level he lost reincaranting as he is writing a character background which, in my campaign, nets you about 1800 XP). He might even choose the Spirit Shaman from Complete Arcane (? - maybe it's Complete Divine) which I would house rule is the favoured class of gnomes since it's mechanics fit the background og gnomes far better than the 'vanilla' druid.

As for the future I think my rules on absentism are going to change. Before the PCs of absent players would be run by other players but after this I don't know anymore. Obviously I'm going to talk about it with my players and find out what they prefer but I think i might go the 'fade into the background' route whenever possible fom now on. There are 2 other players who miss games (especailly in winter with being 2 hours away) and right now I have them played by other players but only earning 1/2 XP. There is the danger of them dying (like happened here) but they at least are not falling too far behind the rest of the group in levels (I think the one Fighter is 5th and about 1500 XP from 6th while the other is 5th and about 4000XP from 6th. Most of the rest of the group are 6th but most of them have written the character backgrounds to get the 1800XP bonus). Of couse if I do the fade to the background (which has already happened to the one character as his player won't be back until summer) they won't gain any XP. Well I'll defer to the players' wishes - they are thewir characters afterall.

 

[JoeGKushner]

Brief absence? I either run it as an NPC or let another player run it. The missing player is informed in full that his character may die but in exchange, gets full share of treasure and experience points. If player running the extra character does a good job, I give him extra experience points.

Long term absense? No problem. Character either retires or becomes an NPC under the GM's complete control with no going back. Too many times I've seen players feel that the character was able to flourish when played X as opposed to Y and then want the character back. "Well, I never thought of actually joining a mage guild and getting access to spells. I'm a loner man! But those spells are sweet..."

 

[rln]

A game a friend of mine played in had a somewhat weird approach: The Curse of the Gray stone.

Apparently, this was a curse uttered by some witch A Long Time Ago over the party group. Anyone who joined the group was affected by it. In-game, this meant that every now and then, people would turn into a small gray stone (when their players didn't show up, went to the bathroom, etc). This rock would be picked up by the other PCs until they turned back to normal.

Of course, had the previous game ended att a cliffhanger just before the BBEG, the party could suddenly find themselves heavily outnumbered, but a few rocks richer

 

[Gez]

Can't happen in my games either.

We have 4 (well, 3.5 rather) ongoing D&D campaigns, plus an even bigger number of non-D&D campaigns, and a similar number of stalled campaigns. The five members, me included, of our little gaming group are not necessarily present in everyone of them.

That way, when someone's not there, we just run a campaign where that person doesn't play.

 

[Altamont Ravenard]

An absent player can't have his character die IMC.

As for XP, absent characters never fall too far behind. It's assumed that they did something while they were gone, while not getting in too much trouble.

Versimilitude might suffer a bit, but I don't want big level gaps or a player losing a character while he had no chance to do anything about it.

AR

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

If a player cannot make it, that player usually designates who will play the character in his or her place. As DM, I moderate such play, if the designated player starts to do foolish things with the missing players character (things that are not like the character normally) I will usually intervene to keep it from happening.

If multiple players cannnot make it and things can work out well, I will try and make a reason the characters are gone. I just had this happen recently. Three players had to abandon the game right at the start due when one of the players' phone rang and they received news that a friend of theirs who had been very ill had died. After they left, the rest of us decided that we should still play (we do not play very regularly and one player drives 90 minutes to get to the games). We decided that the three players' characters had to deliver a critical material to the Wizards they had been working for. The rest of the party went off on an adventure that would suit their reduced numbers and a couple weeks ago I played out the delivery mission for the three missing players. The wizard who they work for will magically transport them back to the rest of the party so next time we play they will all be together.

 

[the Jester]

We use the fade into the background system for the most part, justifying it as guarding the rear, diseaase, constipation or whatever.

The exception is the 'inescapable location + tpk' rule. If a pc has entered an 'inescapable location' with the party and there is a tpk, that pc is dead even if his player misses the session wherein the tpk happens.

 

[BOZ]

i wasn't too happy recently. when i came back after missing a game due to my grandma's funeral (how the hell could i have helped that?), i found out that my longtime drinkin' cursin' <bleep>in' Dwarf Cleric/Paladin had died, after making a decision that i felt i wouldn't have made if i were playing. "sure, let's free those poor people from the hundreds of cultist by having a huge melee!" well, i'm not positive that's how it happened, but paladin or not i wouldn't have agreed to something so inherently dangerous. and he wasn't the only PC killed.

let's just say, i better damn well get my dwarf back.

he supposedly went up 2 levels before he got killed - so i would even settle for an ordinary raise dead since i didn't get the chance to enjoy them.

 

[BOZ]

oh, and i generally do what i can in my power to keep a PC with an absent player from dying in any campaign i run. something's too dangerous/risky? sorry, can't do it right now. some friends i got.