Replacement characters..what level?

[MerakSpielman]

My feeling is the exact opposite: If the sting of character death needs to be reinforced through game mechanics {loss of level, abilites, spells, feats etc} then what you're playing is wargame where you get a single unit that feel kinda personally attached to...

A DM saying they need to strip levels from a replacement character is admitting they're running a game where characters are no more than game pieces {which is fine, if that's what you like}.

So are you arguing that there should never be any penalty for death, other than the time spent waiting to get raised? Doesn't this belittle the concept of Heroic Sacrifice, if there is never a real sacrifice?

edit: how is your method any different from a wargame where you always get one unit, and when it dies, you just take it off the board for a few minutes, then put it back?

Do the NPCs follow the same rules? I think the game world should be consistant for all inhabitants, including defeated NPCs.

 

[Mallus]

So are you arguing that there should never be any penalty for death, other than the time spent waiting to get raised? Doesn't this belittle the concept of Heroic Sacrifice, if there is never a real sacrifice?

I'm not talking about raising/ressurecting PC's. That's a different issue. I don't think that readily available ressurrections are good for a campaign, or at least one of my campaigns.

The penalty for dying {and starting a new PC} is dying and starting a new PC. All they dead characters made-up glories and great deeds are but dust in the made-up wind. And now a new character must start from scratch plot-wise. That's the one rule I do enforce: no replacement PC or new entry can be as important in the grand scheme of made-up things {hmmm, coffee psychosis setting in...} as the existing characters.

The reward for play is the play. He who dies with the best stories, wins. Replacement PC's start with neglible story, and that's enough of a death-penalty {hmmm, more coffee would be nice...} for me.

 

[PaulGreystoke]

Celebrim said:

I use to run it at 1/2 half XP, which was roughly one level less in most cases in 1st edition. I'm not sure how well that would work for 3rd edition.

This was my system for 1e & 2e also. It worked quite well with the geometric progression of level vs. XP. But in 3e with the somewhat more linear XP chart this could lead to some serious lagging, so I adopted a 3/4 rule that worked well. Any new characters come in at 75% of the XP awarded to the party. I adapted my XP calculation spreadsheet to track this & have had no problems.

 

[ruleslawyer]

Mallus: I see your point, but you're also attempting to generate too many assumptions in its support. Assumption #1: Raising/ resurrection is hard to get. Assumption #2: The players care enough about their characters to mourn the loss of a favored character.

The reason I label #2 an "assumption" is because some players are powergamers to the extent that rolling up a new character of equal level isn't a real loss, but an excuse to generate exactly the combination of abilities that the player wants from scratch. Agreed, with true roleplayers, having to tear up a favored character's sheet is punishment enough; however, there are players, and even entire groups, who might not care as much. I know that if the wizard PC's player in my group died, he'd just generate that selfsame wizard's "cousin" with better chosen feats, skills, and a good prestige class or two.

In any case, my problem IMC is suspension of disbelief. My PCs are now 21st level average, and I have serious issues with introducing new 20th-level PCs into the campaign, as it becomes increasingly difficult to explain where these PCs come from. I may start encouraging players to take ECL races as replacements, since it would at least introduce some interesting new character alternatives (half-fiend troll Bbn5, anyone?).

My rule, incidentally, historically has been two levels below the dead PC. Makes raising a better solution than rolling up a new character, but still keeps the PC quite on track with the established party.

 

[National Acrobat]

Same level as everyone else. I don't dole out xp, I just announce when it is time to level, and I like everyone to be on the same page with regards to encounters and what they can handle. Since I only have 4 players (and no cleric) in my group, this makes good sense. Only 1 is a spell caster and when he died, I definately wanted them the same level so that I didn't have the SR issue with the adversaries totally negating the only spell caster. I guess it is a preference thing but I certainly don't believe in penalizing players for their character death. Of course, I don't allow ressurection either, or raise dead.

 

[Tsyr]

I just don't feel that a player should be allowed to weasel around the "lose a level" factor of death by choosing to bring in a new character of the same level as the dead one. Heck, they could bring in a "new" character of the same class, take all the items of the dead character, and proceed just like nothing had happened.

I'll tell you what prevents my players from doing that. If they even *tried* it, they would never be welcome at my table again. That's blatent meta-gaming at it's worst, and completely ignoring any semblance of "Yeah, there is actualy a *world* here we are interacting with, not just a paper-representation of ourself". I don't allow people to do things like that at my table. Thankfully, that's never come up... it's just not the way people play the game around here.

 

[Fenes 2]

I am often baffled by the importance some people put on the rules and penalties in the books. It seems that only the holy writ of the PHB and an ever-vigilant DM prevent their players from either sneaking in overpowered characters or slacking off in the fight against the DM's monsters.

Me, I play for fun. If rules get in the way of the group's fun, out go the rules. If no one in the group is opposed to or hurt by something, it is allowed no matter the rules. If a player wants a new character and that change does not ruin a campaign as far as we can see, then he gets a new character, same level as everyone else, with gear to match.

I do not need rules to stop people from exploiting that just as I do not need rules to prevent people from killing off other PCs for fun - if such things would happen I would ask the player to stop being antisocial and show some consideration for the rest of the group. If said hypothetical player would not comply with my request I would just boot him and retcon his actions.

I am too old to bother with in-game solutions to personality problems between players and/or DMs.

 

[Tsyr]

There seems to be two sides to this debate.

One side (The admitedly larger side) views DnD as, best I can tell, an extension of the rules. A wargame, if you will. They may or may not roleplay heavily (I don't know you enough to tell one way or 'tuther), but that first and foremost, DnD is about some semblance of rules and a "contest". This side generaly either favors a semi "by the rules" approach of 1 level lost regardless, or something a bit harsher, in order to discourage meta-game manipulation of the system.


The other side views DnD as, I would say, a means to have a good time with people first, and a contest and set of rules second. This side generaly has no or very leniant penalties, or starts at a low level for some other reason (IE, feeling that a character isn't "complete" unless they start from the ground up), and has or feels no reason to impose a meta-game penalty for things.

I don't know how accurate this is, so feel free to yell at me and tell me I'm being an idiot or whatever, but that is how it seems to me.

 

[kingpaul]

This happened IMC, as my character passed on. The DM took the average level of the remaining party, which was 3, and had me start with 2000xp, 1/2 way between 2nd and 3rd.

 

[National Acrobat]

The other side views DnD as, I would say, a means to have a good time with people first, and a contest and set of rules second. This side generaly has no or very leniant penalties, or starts at a low level for some other reason (IE, feeling that a character isn't "complete" unless they start from the ground up), and has or feels no reason to impose a meta-game penalty for things.

I don't know how accurate this is, so feel free to yell at me and tell me I'm being an idiot or whatever, but that is how it seems to me. [/B]

I am from the 2nd group but with some serious differences. My players and I have no problem with starting a character at a level other than first. A character can have a history regardless of whether they come from the ground up. In fact, I encourage that so that plot device can be used, whether you are 1st or 15th level. Secondly, being that we are role playing heavy, with emphasis on the rules, OOC knowledge is penalized if used. I don't have to worry about meta-gaming too much with my bunch.

I discovered early on in 3E, with a small party (4) that characters who are not of the same level as the party die quicker in encounters. Granted, I am running Against the Giants: The Liberation of Geoff, which even with the party at 13th level can be tought. I also don't use Raise Dead or Ressurection. My view and that of my players is that death should be viewed as a natural thing and therefore, coming back from the dead is not right.