I'm planning a Western Marches campaign for about 6-10 family members with an average session size of 3-5, and I want some opinions on something I'm toying with to make death a part of the game that has some consequences but doesn't just frustrate everyone and make them stop playing because they're rerolling characters every other session.
Basically, the idea is to import a feature I've seen in JRPGs and such where, if you die, you find yourself resurrected in the church back in town. Or, you can think of it like Monster Hunter, where your unconscious body gets dragged back to town. But basically, I'm going to make them pray and tithe to the church in town (which some characters may choose not to do), and in return, if they die in the wilderness, they'll be resurrected the next day in the church without any of the gear, items, and money they were carrying. If a session's party is 3 PCs and one dies, then they'll just be out for the rest of the day and the remaining 2 will have to determine if they want to press on and risk dying themselves, or if they want to go back for their comrade and lose all the progress towards their goal. That way, there really is an incentive not to die (lose your gear and possibly scrub the excursion), but they can commit to becoming attached to their character and fleshing out their backstory without fear that death will rip them away.
So, I understand that in D&D part of the tension comes from the threat of negative consequences for actions and that death is a large part of those negative consequences. Some may argue that taking away that risk will dissolve that tension and make the game boring and predictable. However, I think that I can balance this by keeping the above-mentioned consequences for dying, and by also making possibly deadly encounters an active part of the game. If they know that some encounters might be legit deadly, the tension can come from deciding whether to flee or find a creative solution to the encounter. And who knows, maybe by removing the risk of gambling their beloved character's life, they'll feel more comfortable getting creative and swinging for the fences (like a party I was in who survived a green dragon encounter by getting him really high on silverweed while he was asleep).
Anyway, I just wanted some thoughts on this possible mechanic before I commit myself to figure out the finer mechanics of balancing it, like how much they have to tithe to the church. Heck, it could even be a major plot point in the campaign at one point where an outside force comes in and steals all the priests, making a rescue mission that carries the risk of permadeath!
I’m in the camp that it will water down the game. The reasons those JRPGs work that way is because they have to. You cannot start a new character and continue the story, it won’t make any sense. D&D doesn’t have to do that. If a PC dies and a new one gets rolled up, they just start with their own bit of story. That’s especially true for West Marches.
Another problem I could foresee is that some characters might not want to tithe for roleplaying reasons. The greedy thief who won’t spare a coin for anyone or the iconoclastic wizard who kneels to no being shouldn’t suffer (much) for committing to their roleplay. Plus, I think a lot of the fun of West Marches games is the character turnover, since the games aren’t that story-heavy. Some players will enjoy that.
I have a homebrew death mechanic that might interest you.
My players love RP, so whenever there is a character death, the dead character and anyone within 10ft of them during a revival attempt is transported to a judgment hall in the divine realm. What ensues is a social encounter/skill challenge, wherein the players try to influence the god to restore the dead person to life. I allow a ton of different rolls (performance, religion, intimidation, athletics, tinker tools checks...anything that allows a character to amuse, impress, threaten or otherwise cajole an all-powerful being into doing what they want). Everyone can participate, but only one skill can be used per person - that way, everyone contributes something unique to the skill check and not everyone is rolling persuasion. And yes, the dead character participates in this too.
Based on the group's rolls, there can be serious benefits OR drawbacks to the revival attempt, and it's a sliding scale:
Superior Success: All rolls exceed DC by 5+, dead character is restored with full HP. Majority Success: All rolls exceed or meet DC, dead character is restored with no ill effects. Mixed Success: Most rolls meet/exceed DC but some fail, dead character is restored with 1 point of exhaustion. Majority Failure: Most rolls fail, dead character is not revived but soul can be retrieved with a side quest to the divine realm. Total Failure: Most/all rolls fail the DC by 5+, soul is reaped by the god and cannot be retrieved short of a Wish spell.
Obviously, the more people who participate in this revival attempt, the easier it is to get successful results. Teamwork and party cohesion is important, since one bad roll in a skill check with 2 people is much more devastating than one bad roll in a skill check with 5 people.
I've found this has made death a more interesting part of the game, brings the pantheon into play, and adds an element of uncertainty to spells like Revivify. The PCs in my campaign are now both terrified of going to "God Court" and simultaneously excited for another chance to literally argue with a god. Might not be at all what you're looking for, but it's just something to chew on as you consider death in your games.
You might do one revive as a Reborn (UA) kinda like The Crow, and the next time you just dead.
Oh, or another idea is to just make the cost of each resurrection exponentially more. So like, first taste is free, 2nd one will greatly deplete your treasure store, 3rd one will be a large fortune, and 4th is so expensive that the combined resources of the province area don't even cover it.
That way, it'll give people the option to amass their treasure to ward off death once more, but at the canonical detriment of they won't be able to spend gold and treasure on anything else that you normally would. I'm imagining a frail, wretched-lifestyle PC that is hoarding treasure because they're so afraid of death; it'd be ironic then if they died of disease.
But yeah, it would make my players feel like they have the choice to safeguard a beloved character, but in practicum, they'll only get 1 or 2 mulligans. And if they take that 2nd mulligan and don't want their beloved character to die, they can just "retire" them to a peaceful life in town and roll up a new character.
My players love RP, so whenever there is a character death, the dead character and anyone within 10ft of them during a revival attempt is transported to a judgment hall in the divine realm. What ensues is a social encounter/skill challenge, wherein the players try to influence the god to restore the dead person to life. I allow a ton of different rolls (performance, religion, intimidation, athletics, tinker tools checks...anything that allows a character to amuse, impress, threaten or otherwise cajole an all-powerful being into doing what they want). Everyone can participate, but only one skill can be used per person - that way, everyone contributes something unique to the skill check and not everyone is rolling persuasion. And yes, the dead character participates in this too.
...
I've found this has made death a more interesting part of the game, brings the pantheon into play, and adds an element of uncertainty to spells like Revivify. The PCs in my campaign are now both terrified of going to "God Court" and simultaneously excited for another chance to literally argue with a god. Might not be at all what you're looking for, but it's just something to chew on as you consider death in your games.
This is also something that could work. I'd have to consider how to work it into a West Marches campaign, where who knows who will be arguing at any given time. But it's definitely another thing to consider.
I guess it also will depend on what my players want. In the session 0 it might be good to lay out some options for them and this could definitely be one of them.
Gut feel says not to do this - a West Marches game is supposed to have dangerous areas that a party may not be able to cope with at their power level (and equally areas that they’ll be able to completely walk over, depending on where the group wander). Remove the threat of death (even with a cost that makes it an annoyance) and you take away from the feel of the campaign style somewhat.
If the characters are dying too frequently are they reading the tone of the encounter badly? Are there enough clues to guide them that where they’re heading might be very dangerous? Are they just dim and unable to put 2 and 2 together? If it’s down to randomness of the dice, that’s the way the game works, but if it’s down to poor tactical choices, not comprehending the situation, lack of familiarity with their abilities, or similar then you’ve got teaching moments you can expand upon.
Not every encounter has to be to the death - even predators will play with their prey for a bit before wandering off in boredom - watch a cat. You can have another group come by in the nick of time and assist - not necessarily a complete deus ex moment - the wilderness isn’t always full of helpful people. Perhaps their saviour demands a cost (quest, a fee, something personal etc) for helping out. Maybe their help isn’t quite what it seems - in league with whatever the party stumbled into unintentionally, maybe it’s a bigger and nastier problem than the original encounter and wants something to warn others not to intrude into the area and uses the PCs as mouthpieces to scare away others. Plenty of options for helping the characters out of a scrape and yet costing them more than they intended.
Additional healing is fairly easy to come by - scroll, potion, lost treasures. Even a wandering healer can help them out, for a fee, or not. Unless you’re facing a TPK every session through sheer overkill it’s quite difficult to actually die unless you’re trying to in 5e, compared to other editions and other systems. 7th Sea, as an example sets out that the player characters won’t actually die - there are way worse things the GM can do to a character than mere death...
As an aside, I usually set the expectations of the group that return from death puts a huge strain on the physical form, and limit each character to only three times - one Raise Dead, one Resurrection, and one True Resurrection each. After that, the soul and its mortal form become somewhat disconnected and it’s rarely possible to reconnect the two.
Reincarnation works (spirit takes on a new physical form so no strain on the original corpse), use of (Limited) Wish would probably work to provide additional recovery from, and creative use of other spells, abilities and powers also stand a good chance of working. Just limiting the amount of times one can expect to return gives you the ability not to have never ending rulers (with the riches of an entire kingdom why would the royal family have commissioned an Altar of Resurrection or similar?), keeps the permanent death of a character a danger, albeit one that can be dodged a few time, doesn’t take away from the wonder of a return from death, still keeps things like Revivify valid (spirit hadn’t had time to depart the corpse, hence no limit on its use), and so on.
Video game like save/restore points work in the medium of a video game, but I don’t feel they work so well in a typical tabletop game, genre and specific feel notwithstanding.
I'm planning a Western Marches campaign for about 6-10 family members with an average session size of 3-5, and I want some opinions on something I'm toying with to make death a part of the game that has some consequences but doesn't just frustrate everyone and make them stop playing because they're rerolling characters every other session.
Basically, the idea is to import a feature I've seen in JRPGs and such where, if you die, you find yourself resurrected in the church back in town. Or, you can think of it like Monster Hunter, where your unconscious body gets dragged back to town. But basically, I'm going to make them pray and tithe to the church in town (which some characters may choose not to do), and in return, if they die in the wilderness, they'll be resurrected the next day in the church without any of the gear, items, and money they were carrying. If a session's party is 3 PCs and one dies, then they'll just be out for the rest of the day and the remaining 2 will have to determine if they want to press on and risk dying themselves, or if they want to go back for their comrade and lose all the progress towards their goal. That way, there really is an incentive not to die (lose your gear and possibly scrub the excursion), but they can commit to becoming attached to their character and fleshing out their backstory without fear that death will rip them away.
So, I understand that in D&D part of the tension comes from the threat of negative consequences for actions and that death is a large part of those negative consequences. Some may argue that taking away that risk will dissolve that tension and make the game boring and predictable. However, I think that I can balance this by keeping the above-mentioned consequences for dying, and by also making possibly deadly encounters an active part of the game. If they know that some encounters might be legit deadly, the tension can come from deciding whether to flee or find a creative solution to the encounter. And who knows, maybe by removing the risk of gambling their beloved character's life, they'll feel more comfortable getting creative and swinging for the fences (like a party I was in who survived a green dragon encounter by getting him really high on silverweed while he was asleep).
Anyway, I just wanted some thoughts on this possible mechanic before I commit myself to figure out the finer mechanics of balancing it, like how much they have to tithe to the church. Heck, it could even be a major plot point in the campaign at one point where an outside force comes in and steals all the priests, making a rescue mission that carries the risk of permadeath!
I’m in the camp that it will water down the game. The reasons those JRPGs work that way is because they have to. You cannot start a new character and continue the story, it won’t make any sense. D&D doesn’t have to do that. If a PC dies and a new one gets rolled up, they just start with their own bit of story. That’s especially true for West Marches.
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Another problem I could foresee is that some characters might not want to tithe for roleplaying reasons. The greedy thief who won’t spare a coin for anyone or the iconoclastic wizard who kneels to no being shouldn’t suffer (much) for committing to their roleplay. Plus, I think a lot of the fun of West Marches games is the character turnover, since the games aren’t that story-heavy. Some players will enjoy that.
Wizard (Gandalf) of the Tolkien Club
I have a homebrew death mechanic that might interest you.
My players love RP, so whenever there is a character death, the dead character and anyone within 10ft of them during a revival attempt is transported to a judgment hall in the divine realm. What ensues is a social encounter/skill challenge, wherein the players try to influence the god to restore the dead person to life. I allow a ton of different rolls (performance, religion, intimidation, athletics, tinker tools checks...anything that allows a character to amuse, impress, threaten or otherwise cajole an all-powerful being into doing what they want). Everyone can participate, but only one skill can be used per person - that way, everyone contributes something unique to the skill check and not everyone is rolling persuasion. And yes, the dead character participates in this too.
Based on the group's rolls, there can be serious benefits OR drawbacks to the revival attempt, and it's a sliding scale:
Superior Success: All rolls exceed DC by 5+, dead character is restored with full HP.
Majority Success: All rolls exceed or meet DC, dead character is restored with no ill effects.
Mixed Success: Most rolls meet/exceed DC but some fail, dead character is restored with 1 point of exhaustion.
Majority Failure: Most rolls fail, dead character is not revived but soul can be retrieved with a side quest to the divine realm.
Total Failure: Most/all rolls fail the DC by 5+, soul is reaped by the god and cannot be retrieved short of a Wish spell.
Obviously, the more people who participate in this revival attempt, the easier it is to get successful results. Teamwork and party cohesion is important, since one bad roll in a skill check with 2 people is much more devastating than one bad roll in a skill check with 5 people.
I've found this has made death a more interesting part of the game, brings the pantheon into play, and adds an element of uncertainty to spells like Revivify. The PCs in my campaign are now both terrified of going to "God Court" and simultaneously excited for another chance to literally argue with a god. Might not be at all what you're looking for, but it's just something to chew on as you consider death in your games.
You might do one revive as a Reborn (UA) kinda like The Crow, and the next time you just dead.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
Oh, or another idea is to just make the cost of each resurrection exponentially more. So like, first taste is free, 2nd one will greatly deplete your treasure store, 3rd one will be a large fortune, and 4th is so expensive that the combined resources of the province area don't even cover it.
That way, it'll give people the option to amass their treasure to ward off death once more, but at the canonical detriment of they won't be able to spend gold and treasure on anything else that you normally would. I'm imagining a frail, wretched-lifestyle PC that is hoarding treasure because they're so afraid of death; it'd be ironic then if they died of disease.
But yeah, it would make my players feel like they have the choice to safeguard a beloved character, but in practicum, they'll only get 1 or 2 mulligans. And if they take that 2nd mulligan and don't want their beloved character to die, they can just "retire" them to a peaceful life in town and roll up a new character.
I'm already glad I asked for some thoughts.
This is also something that could work. I'd have to consider how to work it into a West Marches campaign, where who knows who will be arguing at any given time. But it's definitely another thing to consider.
I guess it also will depend on what my players want. In the session 0 it might be good to lay out some options for them and this could definitely be one of them.
Gut feel says not to do this - a West Marches game is supposed to have dangerous areas that a party may not be able to cope with at their power level (and equally areas that they’ll be able to completely walk over, depending on where the group wander). Remove the threat of death (even with a cost that makes it an annoyance) and you take away from the feel of the campaign style somewhat.
If the characters are dying too frequently are they reading the tone of the encounter badly? Are there enough clues to guide them that where they’re heading might be very dangerous? Are they just dim and unable to put 2 and 2 together? If it’s down to randomness of the dice, that’s the way the game works, but if it’s down to poor tactical choices, not comprehending the situation, lack of familiarity with their abilities, or similar then you’ve got teaching moments you can expand upon.
Not every encounter has to be to the death - even predators will play with their prey for a bit before wandering off in boredom - watch a cat. You can have another group come by in the nick of time and assist - not necessarily a complete deus ex moment - the wilderness isn’t always full of helpful people. Perhaps their saviour demands a cost (quest, a fee, something personal etc) for helping out. Maybe their help isn’t quite what it seems - in league with whatever the party stumbled into unintentionally, maybe it’s a bigger and nastier problem than the original encounter and wants something to warn others not to intrude into the area and uses the PCs as mouthpieces to scare away others. Plenty of options for helping the characters out of a scrape and yet costing them more than they intended.
Additional healing is fairly easy to come by - scroll, potion, lost treasures. Even a wandering healer can help them out, for a fee, or not. Unless you’re facing a TPK every session through sheer overkill it’s quite difficult to actually die unless you’re trying to in 5e, compared to other editions and other systems. 7th Sea, as an example sets out that the player characters won’t actually die - there are way worse things the GM can do to a character than mere death...
As an aside, I usually set the expectations of the group that return from death puts a huge strain on the physical form, and limit each character to only three times - one Raise Dead, one Resurrection, and one True Resurrection each. After that, the soul and its mortal form become somewhat disconnected and it’s rarely possible to reconnect the two.
Reincarnation works (spirit takes on a new physical form so no strain on the original corpse), use of (Limited) Wish would probably work to provide additional recovery from, and creative use of other spells, abilities and powers also stand a good chance of working. Just limiting the amount of times one can expect to return gives you the ability not to have never ending rulers (with the riches of an entire kingdom why would the royal family have commissioned an Altar of Resurrection or similar?), keeps the permanent death of a character a danger, albeit one that can be dodged a few time, doesn’t take away from the wonder of a return from death, still keeps things like Revivify valid (spirit hadn’t had time to depart the corpse, hence no limit on its use), and so on.
Video game like save/restore points work in the medium of a video game, but I don’t feel they work so well in a typical tabletop game, genre and specific feel notwithstanding.
Great idea, or if they're a human, elf, or dragonborn, they could use the revenant template UA
Mystic v3 should be official, nuff said.
I got players to create three characters. That way if one dies there is another one waiting to go.