Replacing dead characters with similar ones

[Jefe Bergenstein]

Beerfest has the right idea.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0w9DUTcAI0o

They can lampshade it, throw a "Jr" on the character sheet, whatever. People get to play what they want to play at my table. RAW D&D makes it trivially easy to come back from the dead anyways, doubly so in 5E with Revivify being a 3rd level spell.

Now getting over being tired... no way. That's right folks, it's easier to raise the dead than cure a level of exhaustion.

 

[Satyrn]

"In-your-face melee guy" is the character type I have significantly more fun with than any other.

I can't imagine why I'd tell someone else they can't play to their preferences when I know I have my own.

 

[5ekyu]

How do you feel about players who replace their dead characters with similar ones (Such as a dead War cleric being replaced by a tempest cleric). I feel like its uncreative, but if your dead character filled a certain party role, it would be necessary for the new character to be able to fill that role themselves.

So how different would a new character have to be to be an acceptable replacement to the old one? Would a simple change in race, subclass, or personality be enough, or would you rather you get a wizard in your party after your main tank dies?

As a GM i try to stay out of telling my folks what to play and how they should be having fun.

So if they want to bring in a similar character to the one they just lost, that is fine.

if it is a novice player, i *might* mention some other alternatives to try and show them the scope of choices they have. Might even suggest bringing in a "pre-gen" or two for a session or two each, to let them see a few runs with other stuff, before getting them to do an official next character. But thats only as a help for new players.

Regardless, i give a 1-2 level "test drive" for any PC (frankly at game start the entire tier 1 is test drive) where they can make changes and such.

But, just because I switch a lot between different things - that doesn't mean that has objective value and that i should push others that way.

 

[Oofta]

"Hey Brad, did you roll up a character?"

"Yeah!"

"Is it, by any chance, Legolas, the Elven Fighter with a Bow, just like you have for the last 10 years running?"

"...... um ..... no. It's ..... Blegolas, the Elven .... Ranger .... who is really good with a bow."


Some times, you just have to roll with it.

Even if that PC is Sir McStabsalot, holy knight of the order of the owl?

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Even if that PC is Sir McStabsalot, holy knight of the order of the owl?

View attachment 105078

He’d have been a great adventuring companion to my character, The Gnome Ranger* and his trusty steed, Mithril.**






* wielding twin repeating hand crossbows loaded with silver-tipped bolts.
** a giant space hamster

 

[ClaytonCross]

Role play, it makes since that if a Role is missing from the Party that is what they would most willingly recruit into their number. I have not problem with that and it causes less problems. For example, healer dies, player comes back as a scout... party has a scout already now they fight over who does what and when, possibly one of them ends up changing characters through role play for meta reasoning. If the original scout didn't want to change and the original cleric was happy being a healer but only changed because the GM didn't like them coming back as the same role, then 2 players are now unhappy and one left a character which the player an party was invested in for a meta game reason that only hurts the game in my opinion.

As far as the race, class, and subclass... I feel like they need to change something to distinguish the character or players might just merge them mentally and death loses value of investment. I would prefer if the human cleric PC dies and the Player wants to be a healer, he next character be an elf druid healer (for example) over a anther human cleric so that the feel is different. However, if a player can create a sufficient backstory that explains it... like twin honoring his brother, the clerical order sending a replacement "understudy" to fill the void for this highly important mission of which they were informed. But that needs to happened within reason in the story with the order, brother, etc being informed. If they are in the middle of a dungeon when a player dies that player will need to justify how this person managed to be there to be found which makes a random … "we found a druid in a cell, WHAT LUCK we really need a replacement for our healer!!" a lot easier to work in despite being super convenient. If after the dungeon the order, brother, etc is notified and the player wants the now free druid to "move on" and return to their family.... I am okay with that. Their is perhaps a chance that they discover they like their temporary character and it becomes permanent. I leave that up to the player. What I don't do is have the player wait until they finish 3 sessions in the dungeon to bring in a new character. I will always find a way to give them chance to play a temporary character until they can add the one they want, even if I just end up giving them an NPC that was traveling with the group. I see no reason to ever have a player who took the effort to show up "sit this one out" for "the sake of story" … In my opinion, Fun trumps story.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

I´d suggest to play something different to that player. Similar is okish. Identical is not. I mean, of course, sometimes there might be a story reason to have a similar character join. If you were on a holy quest and your cleric dies, another cleric from the same order might join, but I´d usually still suggest trying something new.

 

[Dausuul]

How do you feel about players who replace their dead characters with similar ones (Such as a dead War cleric being replaced by a tempest cleric). I feel like its uncreative, but if your dead character filled a certain party role, it would be necessary for the new character to be able to fill that role themselves.

So how different would a new character have to be to be an acceptable replacement to the old one? Would a simple change in race, subclass, or personality be enough, or would you rather you get a wizard in your party after your main tank dies?

It's not something I worry about. As DM, I'm more concerned about figuring out how the new character is going to integrate into the ongoing plot; frankly, if you want to play your character's long-lost brother who joined the party in search of vengeance, I'm 100% cool with that. You have a motivation for being there, you have a connection to the existing PCs, and you have an in to introduce yourself to key NPCs. If you're the same class and race, well, that makes sense.

As a fellow player, it's not really my business.

Anyway, some folks enjoy playing particular archetypes. There's a guy in my group who almost always plays a rogue or a monk. He likes being an agile, sneaky skirmisher, and he hates playing casters. Why should he be forced to play something he doesn't like? If he ever gets bored with those classes, I'll make suggestions for other stuff he could try, but as long as he's having fun, I think he should go right on playing rogues and monks.

 

[Jer]

I do care more about whether the player is just taking his original sheet, crossing out 'Brog the Bargaian" and replacing it with "Grog the Barbarian" and playing the exact same person.

As a DM this doesn't bother me at all. If a player is doing this it's because the player doesn't want to move out of their comfort zone. They've found a play style and character type that they're comfortable with and they're sticking with it because that's what makes the game fun for them. Great! I want my players to have fun - I'm not their teacher, it's not my job to try to force them out of their comfort zone and be more creative. My job is to host a fun game.

That said, this is much rarer these days than it used to be. Probably because character death is less arbitrary in my games than it used to be because we're running more narratively focused games - unless they die at a dramatic moment, I tend to give the party other losses ("campaign losses" in the vocabulary of 13th age) rather than kill off characters when they fail. When characters die typically the player doesn't want to keep playing the same character because their story is finished, which I think drove at least some of the "cross off the old name and replace it with a new one" back in the days when I ran more "if the dice say you're dead, then you're dead" games.