Piratecat ruined my D&D game

[Jolly Giant]

Something just struck me! I have actually made a few rules for bringing back dead characters, without casting Raise Dead. intended for my Vikings D20 game (see sig.). In Vikings games, Raise Dead is a 9th level spell, so I thought it would be a good idea to have a couple of alternatives that lower-level characters could utilize.

The problem is, these rules don't really sit too well with me. Not that there's anything wrong with them mechanically speaking, it's just that they don't have enough Viking feel to them, IMO. Also; unlike the rest of the book, they aren't based on historical facts or real world Viking belief/practise. What I'll probably do is post them as optional rules in a separate PDF, as a web enhancement.

Not just yet, though. It seems kinda weird to start putting out web enhancements before the book is published. Let me just give you a couple of pointers for now, and you can work out the details yourself if you like the ideas:

Option I: A character can be raised by sacrificing (I'm using sacrifice rules similar to those found in BoVD) a humanoid of equal or higher level, plus valuables roughly equal to a raise dead scroll.

Option II: A dead character can be restored to life via a Heal check, if applied quickly enough (as with first aid/CPR). The DC for the heal check varies depending on the cause of death, and the DC increases by +1 for each round the character has been dead. If the cause of death was Con damage or negative levels, he can't be healed above zero hp until he's regained sufficient Con or at least one level. Even if the check is successful, however, there's only a 5% chance of reviving the pasient. (I've also made a feat that gives a +4 bonus to heal checks made for this purpose, and increases the odds of reviving the patient to 10%.)

 

[Zaruthustran]

Iron Kingdoms (from Privateer Press--the Warmachine guys) imposes a big penalty on raise dead and similar spells. Turns out that in that setting, souls are kind of like the currency of the gods. Once they get a soul the gods don't want to give it back.

The in-game mechanics are fairly straight-forward, with different religions having different % chance of agreeing to cast a Raise Dead spell. You get positive modifiers to the roll is you're especially pious, make an especially large donation, or particularly vital to the goals of the church, or died in unfair circumstances (died "before your time", like from an assassin's blade).

Oh, and the casting priest? He suffers. Big time. He rolls on a table, with side-effects ranging from his his arms atrophying and falling off to permanent Wis drain to every cell in his skin boiling away. You can see why they'd be reluctant to cast.

Healing spells are likewise unreliable. When playing in the Iron Kingdoms, you actually use those tables for natural healing.

-z

 

[Janx]

Something just struck me! I have actually made a few rules for bringing back dead characters, without casting Raise Dead. intended for my Vikings D20 game (see sig.). In Vikings games, Raise Dead is a 9th level spell, so I thought it would be a good idea to have a couple of alternatives that lower-level characters could utilize.

The problem is, these rules don't really sit too well with me. Not that there's anything wrong with them mechanically speaking, it's just that they don't have enough Viking feel to them, IMO. Also; unlike the rest of the book, they aren't based on historical facts or real world Viking belief/practise. What I'll probably do is post them as optional rules in a separate PDF, as a web enhancement.

...snips...

In a viking campaign, I'd bring people back via valhalla or hel (or comparable place per individual), via a quest to said realm, or by bargaining with the appropriate keeper of the realm. In the case of a fallen hero, the PCs would try to bargain with a valkyrie to return him. This could, perhaps, be done temporarily (a loan of the soul), or a trade, or a side quest or debt. If you kept the Raise Dead spell, you could word the fluff as stealing the soul from Valahalla or something.

In any case, PC death can be annoying, can ruin verisimilitude, and generally would be nice to avoid.

 

[Ry]

I had the same problem. Action points are the solution. I strongly believe that you should unbalance play between players characters and NPCs because the players' characters are the ones that really count when we ask if we're having a fun game or a good story. The NPCs can't be pushovers, but again, that's to make the players have fun with the DM, not because they "deserve" to be the PCs equals.

 

[Kafkonia]

I had the same problem. Action points are the solution. I strongly believe that you should unbalance play between players characters and NPCs because the players' characters are the ones that really count when we ask if we're having a fun game or a good story. The NPCs can't be pushovers, but again, that's to make the players have fun with the DM, not because they "deserve" to be the PCs equals.

You could also use something like the Dork 20 deck. I picked it up on Shilsen's advice, and I fully intend to incorporate into the next session of the Temple of Existential Evil game I'm running for my coworkers. Most of the players are new to the game, or at least 3.5, and I'm converting it from Hackmaster on the fly, so I want them to have some wiggle room to save their bacon if necessary.

 

[mmadsen]

The problem with this is that many people (myself included) detest the idea of consequence-free resurrection.

One alternative is to rename raise dead to cure mortal wounds and refine dead to be mortally wounded.

 

[Harm]

If you don't allow raise dead as an easily accessible spell like it was intended to be, you have to pamper your party too much. When a 10th level party faces off against the big baddy, a 10th level wizard, who opens with his sudden maximized fireball, and the party's wizard flops over dead, what do you do? Point at him and laugh as he makes a new character? Gimp the enemy wizard so the party can beat him blindfolded? Or get the wizard raised?

One 10th level opponent isn't even really a big threat to a 10th level party and he'd have to be 3 int not to run in the first place. Doubtless he'll be 1-shotted by the cleric dropping an 80pt sound lance on him or by the melee gang-banging him. However despite not being a big threat, he can kill a character off pretty easily. Unless your party is exceedingly cautious, death shouldn't be all that infrequent. It's a dangerous job after all.

 

[talien]

PC inspired me to run a more epic game and I did A few things that helped.

1) No one died immediately regardless of how negative they were. They had one round to be healed back up. It's surprising what players can accomplish in a round. It was also very cinematic to see how characters scrambled to beat that deadline (No pun intended well maybe a little). As long as the character was brought back up to at least -10 + con modifier they were not permanently dead.

This is funny...I do the same thing in my campaign. Well, almost. I will never just outright kill a PC without making it dramatic. You'll see it in my story hour (eventually, going to take awhile to get to that point), but basically, I always put the person at negative hit points. When it's a really terrible shot, that means -8 or -9.

A PC who is dying, but not dead, changes everything. A dead character can be ignored. A dying character requires his party members to do everything all out to save him. Plus, the dying PC has the thrill of the stabilize roll, so at least he's doing something besides sitting there twiddling his thumbs.

2) the Gods had an investment in the players succeeding so Raising people was a little easier for the PC's. But there was always a cost. Seldom did I actually charge them gold straight out (though the players knew if they could afford it they had better offer the gold or risk upsetting the Gods). When someone died basically the whole party had to contribute. I took each player off to the side and asked what they were willing to give up to have their friend and fellow party member come back. I got all sorts of answers.

The one actual death we've had so far was Beldin the Solani dwarf fighter. Dwarves in Arcanis cannot be raised, but if their bodies are healed of damage by sunrise and their SoulStones are near their bodies, they automatically come back to life.

for example when the character died that the campaign practically hinged on at this point died the dwarf fighter offered his life for the Dead Character. All he heard was "Accepted". The next time the dead character got knocked down below 0 hit points the dwarf fighter found that he instead plunged to that total and effectively gave his life for him. Of course the dwarf fighter was tougher and had a little bit more negative HP wiggle room and survived but from then on he didn't let the other PC out of his sight for fear that would happen again.

What happened was that our resident caster was about to get blasted with a cone of cold he couldn't possibly survive. Beldin, a sworn protector of humanity and lawful good, jumped in front of the blast. He took the full hit, sacrificing himself to save his friend Sebastian. And then Sebastian had to beg, borrow, and steal all of the party's healing potions to get him back to life before sunrise. All told, a bigger drain on the party than if he had just died alone.

I asked the player if he was willing to sacrifice his character, which he did. Mind you, he still suffered the penalties as if he had died, but it made perfect sense in game and changed the dynamic between the two PCs (Beldin had kept a secret from Sebastian, which he was annoyed about).

All told, it was the best death ever. I'm planning on a few others--not saying who!--for folks who aren't going to be able to play going forward. And let me tell you, they are going to go out in style!

 

[Desdichado]

If you don't allow raise dead as an easily accessible spell like it was intended to be, you have to pamper your party too much.

Pshah. Have you read this thread? A whole bunch of people are saying that that's complete hooey. You have to do no such thing. I've done games without there even being healing magic available, and it works fine.

In fact, other than D&D, that's the default for most RPGs anyway.

When a 10th level party faces off against the big baddy, a 10th level wizard, who opens with his sudden maximized fireball, and the party's wizard flops over dead, what do you do? Point at him and laugh as he makes a new character? Gimp the enemy wizard so the party can beat him blindfolded? Or get the wizard raised?

Let the wizard die if he's going to die. Do you have the big baddy turn up every session? If so, that's pretty poor DMing, IME. And if a character can't die at a big, climactic battle with the campaigns archvillian, then that's pretty poor DMing too.

One 10th level opponent isn't even really a big threat to a 10th level party and he'd have to be 3 int not to run in the first place. Doubtless he'll be 1-shotted by the cleric dropping an 80pt sound lance on him or by the melee gang-banging him. However despite not being a big threat, he can kill a character off pretty easily. Unless your party is exceedingly cautious, death shouldn't be all that infrequent. It's a dangerous job after all.

Make up your mind. Either it's easy to kill PCs or it's not. You present a case that it's not that big a deal and then reach the exact opposite conclusion.

 

[Qualidar]

I just want to say that while Piratecat didn't ruin my campaign, he did ruin one session. It's a long, sordid tale, but he was wearing a giant mascot head and no pants.


no pants