D&D General Reincarnate is and has always been, weird.

[Voadam]

It's right there in the middle of the Neutrality column.
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What kind of animal do you reincarnate into? ¯\(ツ)/¯

I had missed that.

What kind of animal and how exactly and to what extent you bias the roll towards an animal result are left to be determined.

 

[CreamCloud0]

Reincarnate (or the base concept behind it) always felt to me (5e is my first edition) like it ought to be the generic first accessible level of revival magic across the classes, like, yes you get to come back but the process is patched together with sticky tape and sealing wax, you come back changed, but you DO come back, your elf should count their blessings that they’re even alive before complaining that they ended up as a goblin.

 

[Kurotowa]

Reincarnate is very quintessentially part of the old "Hardcore Mode Roguelike" style of D&D. You roll up your character and see how far you can get this time, and there's perma-death but with expensive respawns, only here's a budget option with a chance to backfire. Maybe your PC becomes unplayable, maybe they come out of it stronger, you don't know! Do you want to roll the dice?

It's still around because it's a tradition now, but it's kind of out of place.

 

[James Gasik]

There was a time in 3.0 where you could come back as a Dryad. I saw this happen once to a Barbarian. The DM had "her" (no male Dryads, you understand) show up carrying a potted baby tree that she was now bound to.

Given the massive rulings a DM has to make to figure out what the player even retains from their previous existence, what they gain from their new one, adjustments to ability scores, figuring out if you can even use your class abilities or gear, and the normal penalties of daring to come back from the grave, it's no wonder that what could and should be an interesting roleplaying moment usually ends up as a colossal waste of time as the player either quickly finds a "fix" or retires their character one way or another.

I love the possibilities of Reincarnation, but the reality of the spell is just wretched.

 

[Milieu]

your elf should count their blessings that they’re even alive before complaining that they ended up as a goblin.

This reminds me: depending on the edition, Reincarnation might the only option for reviving elves.

OD&D Raise Dead works "with men, elves, and dwarves only", thus excluding halflings.

1e Raise Dead says "When the cleric casts a raise dead spell, he or she can restore life to a dwarf, gnome, half-elf, halfling, or human," thus excluding elves. And Resurrection extends the amount of time they can have been dead, but otherwise says "See raise dead for limitations on what persons can be raised."

2e Raise Dead is the same except it adds, "(other creatures may be allowed at the DM's option)", but Resurrection can "restore life and complete strength to any living creature, including elves".

 

[Seramus]

While it's definitely possible to tell a serious and heartfelt story about Reincarnation (your dead loved one is now a dove, etc), it's mostly a source of pure unadulterated slapstick comedy.

 

[Frozen_Heart]

Yes, that's what I love about it. I just wish the latest version was MORE wierd. I understand why they only want you to be able to come back as a currently playable species (DnDBeyond), but how much cooler would it be if you could come back as a pixie or a medusa or a ghoul, etc.?

It's not as expansive at the early versions, but I at least prefer to extend the table to include all playable species rather than just PHB ones.

Still not sure how age impacts reincarnation. If you're a 250 year old elf, and reincarnate into a human, do you reenact that scene from The Last Crusade where the guy picked the wrong grail?

 

[CreamCloud0]

It's not as expansive at the early versions, but I at least prefer to extend the table to include all playable species rather than just PHB ones.

Still not sure how age impacts reincarnation. If you're a 250 year old elf, and reincarnate into a human, do you reenact that scene from The Last Crusade where the guy picked the wrong grail?

i feel like it would work on relative place in lifespan, that 250 year elf is about a third through their 750 year lifespan so would probably reincarnate as a human in their mid-thirties, otherwise if a long lived species died as soon as they were reincarnated because they were too old i feel like that would be a massive flaw and oversight in the spell.

 

[Frozen_Heart]

i feel like it would work on relative place in lifespan, that 250 year elf is about a third through their 750 year lifespan so would probably reincarnate as a human in their mid-thirties, otherwise if a long lived species died as soon as they were reincarnated because they were too old i feel like that would be a massive flaw and oversight in the spell.

Yeah I feel that one makes the most sense.

Though I'd also be tempted to let the player roll for their new age (as a proportion of adult lifespan). Just to add to the randomness.

The Doctor has reincarnated into a grumpy old man a few times, so it might be able to work.

 

[Koloth]

Have rarely seen Reincarnate used. By the time you have the 6th level Reincarnate, you usually have available the 5th level Raise Dead. And the 7th level Limited Wish is just around the corner. Often the GM would hand wave away the can't Raise Dead that race issue to avoid the party either being down one character in the middle of a module or having to wait while the player makes up a new character and leaves the GM with hand waving how the new character suddenly appears.

The few times Reincarnate got cast, the reason was the player wanted a different character. Basically an early form of retraining before retraining was a thing.