Monstrous Compendium Vol. 1: Spelljammer Creatures
Frozen Sick
D&D Beyond Basic Rules
Basic Rules (2014)
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Monstrous Compendium Vol. 1: Spelljammer CreaturesFrozen SickD&D Beyond Basic RulesBasic Rules (2014)Sign in to view your library & saved favorites.
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Hi all,
I'm somewhat of a newer DM and i had to take a leave from my Campaign for about a year. during that year one of the PC used the same character information in a different campaign. We are just getting my campaign going again and one of the other PCs has a bit of an issue with him playing the "same character" in 2 campaigns. In the other campaign during drawing from the deck of many things that character got sent to an unknown location. The PC with the issue is now telling me he sees the character as "soulless" cause he is not really here.
Different worlds, different universes, the character had different equipment and leveled up in the other campaign but is coming back to my campaign as he was the last day we played.
What would you do?
Thank you for your input
Personally I wouldn’t allow it, as a DM I want each campaign to have unique characters that fit that story so transferring a character from another campaign is not allowed. Added to that using the same character in two campaigns that are both running just sounds like a nightmare for the player as much as anyone, tracking them at two different levels, with two different lots of experiences and what they know just doesn’t sound practical, at that point are they even the same character?
I’d just say they had to create a new character for your campaign and then figure out a way to introduce them while the original character leaves
I don’t think that is the issue here. The OPs campaign was on hiatus, the player ran his character in another campaign but is willing to “reset” the character to the last time it was played in the OPs campaign. No equipment, experience or anything else will cross over. Essentially the character belongs in the OPs campaign, another DM was cool with letting him bring the character into the second campaign where he developed differently. One has nothing to do with the other at this point. If the player can keep them straight, no harm, no foul.
Oh, and I’d tell the other player that he is off-base. That character never left as far as the campaign is concerned, this is a player issue not a character issue from my point of view.
I don't personally see what the issue is as long as they are playing the character fully separately between the 2 campaigns. Any campaign crossover feels like a hard no to me. It sounds like the whole reason this happened in the first place is your campaign was interrupted.
Lots of players love experimenting with various character concepts but others have 1 or 2 archetypes they usually default to. I might nudge for a name change between the 2 campaigns if someone really has an issue with it and those 2 players are in both campaigns. Beyond that as long as the player who has a specific character type they want to play isn't in any way trying to mix the 2 campaigns I don't see why 1 player should be telling another how to have fun.
A name change might help the other player, good call. On the other hand I worked in a fast food restaurant in my youth that had 2 managers and 4 employees all named "Mike". It was fine until I scheduled us all to work on the same night, after that we were all referred to by our last names.
Going to have to ask for some clarifications, you say "One of the other PCs" do you mean the Player, or the Player Character. those are two different things.
To drive this home there is the old joke "Killing a Player Character is part of the game, killing a player is rather extreme and includes prison time."
I need to know if it is an in character or Over table problem.
If this is a "Player has a problem" then my perspective is this.
If they have separate character sheets, then it isn't really a problem. They are separate instances of the same character, likely with differences in backstory to fit the world, or "non canonical to the world."
If the Player who wants special bespoke characters for every game sounds like the problem. I have been playing this game for more than 30 years, several different editions and that means my unique characters that I have played at table are reaching the mid hundreds, so I am no stranger to putting that work in, and lets be honest, you sometimes get attached to a character and want to iterate on them.
New Edition, new table, new DM, all valid reasons to use the same character. Hells smells, I have been trying to find my old sheets so i can turn my Second edition characters into 5.5 characters.
Honing in on the "Soulless" accusation, soullessness is more to do with roleplay instead of repeat characters. The most soulful performance I have seen was from someone who always played the same character, every game, and had his personality and responses down so well, that he was the roleplay springboard for various different groups to start delving into their own characters.
If this is a "Player Character" has a problem, then it is part of the roleplay, and you should talk to the both of them and see if they are playing on the same wavelength. If they are, just make sure the rest of the table knows this is inter-character drama and not inter-player drama.
He/Him. Loooooooooong time Player.
The Dark days of the THAC0 system are behind us.
"Hope is a fire that burns in us all If only an ember, awaiting your call
To rise up in triumph should we all unite
The spark for change is yours to ignite."
Kalandra - The State of the World
new characters all around. a year gap means a new start, sure let them roll up new characters at the level you are picking up from. Also let everyone know that a 40 year Vetran D&D player says half the fun is character creation, never use the same character twice.
Also let everyone know that a 46 year Veteran D&D player and DM disagrees and advises that the number of years we have played has no bearing on the validity of our opinions in whether or not playing old characters is fun.