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...
D&D 5E How to add new PCs mid quest?
- Thread starter randrak
- Start date
Horwath
Legend
He is prisoner of the next group of mobs,
He is also on that mission sent by another patron,
He is sent by your patron as a backup,
Deus ex machina: he suffered teleportation mishap and teleported to your camp,
iserith
Magic Wordsmith
Hard to say without knowing more details. Fictionally, it could be anything you can imagine. Someone lost in the forest may be fine. A prisoner of monsters the PCs can free. A prophet who has received visions of the PCs and finds them to join their quest. Someone who is already at the dungeon for their own reasons. Etc.
This is partly why I have the PCs establish backup characters at the start of every campaign. If someone dies, we tap the new character in with no issues because we've planned for it by establishing the necessary connections and backstory in advance. In my current campaign, for example, the PCs have a caravan. Their active characters go out and adventure while the caravan, guarded by their backup characters, provides a safe place to long rest. When a PC dies, they can just call up the appropriate backup character to take his or her place seamlessly.
This is partly why I have the PCs establish backup characters at the start of every campaign. If someone dies, we tap the new character in with no issues because we've planned for it by establishing the necessary connections and backstory in advance. In my current campaign, for example, the PCs have a caravan. Their active characters go out and adventure while the caravan, guarded by their backup characters, provides a safe place to long rest. When a PC dies, they can just call up the appropriate backup character to take his or her place seamlessly.
BoldItalic
First Post
Invite the player to explain his new character's sudden presence in the party and ask each of the other players if they accept the fiction he is offering. Let them suggest embellishments to add plausibility. Then, as long as the players collectively agree to the narrative, you don't have a problem.
pdzoch
Explorer
You could also tie the new PC to one of your adventure hooks. The PC could either be related to something in the adventure hook or be seeking the same thing and the group just happened to converge and join forces to share a goal.
I've used the "rescued" PC approach several times. Once as a captive of the band of monsters in the next encounter. Once as a PC running away from a pack of Axebeaks riled up during a botched field study (it was a druid).
I would also take a look at the new PC background to see how that can be used for an introduction. With the right background, the new PC could be introduced as an authority on something the party is looking for or has to interact with.
I've used the "rescued" PC approach several times. Once as a captive of the band of monsters in the next encounter. Once as a PC running away from a pack of Axebeaks riled up during a botched field study (it was a druid).
I would also take a look at the new PC background to see how that can be used for an introduction. With the right background, the new PC could be introduced as an authority on something the party is looking for or has to interact with.
ccs
41st lv DM
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.
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.
It could also depend on what the new character is. If they are a ranger or barbarian, the could just live in the wilds and find the party. Perhaps they had a problem with whatever ambushed the party and were tracking the ambushers to take them out. If it's cleric or paladin, maybe their deity sent them to recover the artifact. Or a wizard or rogue heard about the artifact and want it to study or sell. Or perhaps the person was also hired to get the artifact by someone else. There are dozens of reasons for the new character to be out there. It could be completely by chance and the new character is doing something unrelated. You could even have the party come upon the new player in a situation where perhaps they were ambushed too and the party has to help them.
It's hard to say more without specifics. Like what ambushed them. We'll need a little more than "something ambushed the party and one of them died" to give you more specific ideas. Did the ambushers take prisoners? Maybe they find the new member as a captive in the ambusher's camp, not far away. There are a lot of ways to handle it though. Plus you can just invite the player to come up with a reason their new character would be there. It's their character after all and they know that character best. Let the player be creative and have some fun while having them do some of the heavy lifting. They probably already have ideas.
It's hard to say more without specifics. Like what ambushed them. We'll need a little more than "something ambushed the party and one of them died" to give you more specific ideas. Did the ambushers take prisoners? Maybe they find the new member as a captive in the ambusher's camp, not far away. There are a lot of ways to handle it though. Plus you can just invite the player to come up with a reason their new character would be there. It's their character after all and they know that character best. Let the player be creative and have some fun while having them do some of the heavy lifting. They probably already have ideas.
Ralif Redhammer
Legend
I’m a big fan of this. I might have the character introduced in some improbable situation (falling from a random portal, imprisoned in the next room, appearing from a scroll they just found), and just ask them to explain how the heck they got there.
Tony Vargas
Legend
When the party defeats the next batch of bad-guys, they find the new PC tied up in a closet, stripped of all his gear - unless the party heals him, he wakes up at 1hp in 1d4 hours.
Welcome aboard.
...
what?
OK, fine, for more of a hook, maybe he just happens to have overheard information vital to the secret mission and/or have an interest in it and/or been one of the earlier agents sent to deal with the badguys?
Last edited:
Ralif Redhammer
Legend
Lanefan
Victoria Rules
Davelozzi
Explorer
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
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."
"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!
18/100 Strength!
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
First Post
Once I was in this position. I was bound and gagged (kidnapped). The party found me and cut me loose, and I joined them.
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).
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).
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?")
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?")
doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
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.
Similar Threads
