Eh, in a world where you can just pay someone to raise your friend from the dead with nothing more then a body part and some diamond dust (I think that’s still relevant) the consequences are really only as grim as your budget, and I’d say the princess could just loan mimic some money to have her rezzed if he lack the money himself.
Sure, if the DM allows that. He may be a stickler about the [i]availability[/I] of 5000GP worth of diamond dust. So it could end up being a whole other quest just to obtain that.
Also, he could also do what I would do in that situation, and bring back the System Shock% from AD&D. Death really shouldn’t become a revolving door once the party is high enough levelled to make it so. There should always be the risk of finality, to maintain the players’ incentive to think things through. But maybe that’s just me.
At least in 3.5, there are high-level threats that can’t be come back as easily as death can.
Starting with Raise Dead, problems that you face are: money, death attacks, undeadification, magical aging, level/Constitution loss, not being able to retrieve the body quickly enough (1 day per level of the spellcaster) or at all (TPK?). From there, we move onto Resurrection, which (with an increase in spell level, and an increasing penalty of money) still has the issues of magical aging, level/Constitution loss and not being able to retrieve part of the body (such as the body being put in an extradimensional space, and that space being destroyed), while True Resurrection still falls short in the magical aging and money categories.
That’s not even looking at effects that bypass death and dying entirely. In open game content, we have Trap the Soul, Soul Bind, Temporal Stasis (and its big brother Imprisonment), being Sequester-ed and sent to a secure location, or even being turned into your allies’ enemy with Dominate Monster or Modify Memory (which is why immunity to mind-affecting effects is a priority in many circles).
And if we want to go psionic, there’s Microcosm, Mind Seed (especially a fun one), and the non-mind-affecting Decerebrate.
Notice that I haven’t even gotten into the numerous artifacts printed explicitly for this purpose, or even cursed items like the Bag of Devouring, which has a 50% chance to prevent mortal magic (including wishes, miracles and true resurrections) from reviving a consumed creature.
Death is nothing compared to being stuck in suspended animation in a small sphere deep in the earth forever, only to be found by a 15th-level mage looking expressly for you by name and identity; and only to be freed by a mage two levels higher than that.
Also: If you don’t appreciate the style of game where heroes eventually outgrow death itself, maybe D&D isn’t the game for you? There are many, many alternatives out there.
…and that’s just the *game mechanics*. There’s also the ‘role-playing’ aspect of resu…er, TRYING to resurrect a fallen friend; what if the soul doesn’t want to come back?
Not that they hated the adventuring life, or their companions, but what if the afterlife is SO much BETTER?
Take this example above: a *paladin* has sacrificed her life to ensure a malicious and persistent danger to good people everywhere is FINISHED, *AND* also to save a worthy companion from death. Maddie’s reward in the lawful good outer plane of her chosen deity is gonna be PRETTY SWEET – we’re talking having a feast hall just to herself in Valhalla, for instance.
One campaign had gotten kinda derailed when a party member was slain – he was essential for completing the overall goal, and even though we had done everything else needed (materially) to resurrect him, he just refused to return. It took expensive communing with ‘higher ups’ and eventually a planar adventure to meet him in his paradisaical ‘ever after’ and a lot of hair-pulling and bargaining, reasoning, cajoling, etc. to persuade the player’s soul into returning back to ‘prime’ and finishing what he’d started. In the end, it took persuading the soul’s own god itself to suggest that – while his acts in life were wonderful and perfectly deserving of a richly-rewarded afterlife – it WOULD appreciate him doing MORE. The ‘deal’ was sweetened with basically making the character an avatar of the god – the abilities came in handy in the end – and after the Grand Foozle was destroyed and kingdoms were saved, the character ‘ascended’ and became a demigod in service of the higher deity (and thus transferred to the DM as an NPC).
Of course, this played out over a couple of months of play sessions, and while it sidetracked from the original campaign, became one of the best-liked parts of the whole thing – “yeah, we destroyed a lich…and MADE A GOD, TOO!” ^_^
…so while death might become a ‘revolving door’, nobody said that door had to TURN EASILY or RAPIDLY. 😉
But that would be running away from her responsibilities, and that’s not what paladins do. I can’t imagine her refusing to come back to a world where people need her, from a world where they don’t. It’s called Final Reward for a reason, it’ll still be there later.
Oh no, don’t stop Rusty! I don’t care if you only post a comic twice a year, I really, really love these guys. I understand if real life requires it, but you’re breaking my heart!
They’re gonna be pretty disappointed when they realize there’s no treasure left. Air-Looting, more like. It’ll be priceless. Mimic might have to look deep inside himself to find the means to carry off.
What class is mimic anyway? He’s shown no combat ability, and I’ve never seen any magic out of him, so what is he!? A warlord or something? Actually, what’s rusty for that matter? I mean, cubes obviously a fighter if some sort, but rusty and mimic haven’t really done anything relevant a to any class.
I’m not sure what Mimics primary class is (Mimic maybe?) but I do recall him taking a level in Beholder (remember his 1 giant eye?)
I think he might have some monk, with that fancy dodging of Grinners stab earlier (or would that be 1-handed swords, what with the fencing and all that?)
Heal check? On someone with hitpoints beyond -10 (assuming D&D)…she’s already dead.
As for her being dead for good..this system again seems to go by D&D rules…and by it’s rules yes she could very well be gone for good..I hope not but it is possible. Not because they don’t have the ability to bring her back..but because she does not want to come back.
In D&D cosmology, you generally go to somewhere based on your alignment or your god…(I keep hearing it varies :P). Basically Maddy being dead means she is probably in a place where she is essentially rewarded for the life she lived. Living somewhere that ideally lines up nicely with the way she sees things.
And in D&D comming back from a raise dead depends on two things. If they are taken to a gods domain..the god must give their consent…and god or no..the person being raised must actually allow themselves to be raised..they can say no if they like their new home well enough. So the bigger question is..will Maddy see a reason to come back?
I think there is a good chance she’ll want to but, you never know.
I won’t say it’ll be just like that…but the realm will in general be in line with how she sees good, evil, law and freedom. Or will be the realm of her god, if she curried their favor enough (IE acted in a manner they like :P).
Not particularly worried about her wanting to come back, shes a paladin. More then almost any other class the core of a paladin’s character is the selflessness to face pain and suffering so that others don’t have to. Even with getting a paradise for an afterlife a good paladin would go right back if someone needed them after all paradise will still be there when they get back, and Maddie is a very good (if somewhat naive) paladin.
WARNING
block o exposition coming u’ve been warned
on a more technical level basically when i try to decide if a NPC would return when raised i consider a few things,
first alignment – evil being WAAAAAY more likely to come back since being the plaything of evil outsiders SUCKS barring somehow swinging a special position in the afterlife (in which case it might switch to somewhat unlikely), neutral slightly unlikely, and good very unlikely (only the good die for good after all). as for the C/N/L axis, Chaos more likely to come back for unfinished personal motivations, Law more likely to come back given unfinished obligations, neutral somewhat less likely to come back.
Then Religion- I don’t take the view that a deity must specifically let a character come back (or else i don’t see much of anyone coming back from the hells) but direct intervention could be made one way or the other in extraordinary times, mostly i take the general feel given toward life and death into account.
Then class-
Any class with a required alignment (a MUST be rather then can’t be) except druids I consider somewhat more likely to return since it shows a stronger then average commitment to their views in regards to their interactions with the world.
special- Druids very unlikely to come back for any non-druid rez (reincarnate vs raise dead shows a huge difference in philosophy) if reincarnate is used moderately more likely
Non-Druid divine casters moderately more likely (part of the point of these people is to take their faith and inspire people toward their god, even if that means they can’t personally be there for abit longer)
Misc Casters/psions- somewhat more likely learning to work your will on the world fosters a degree of distance blindly accepting divine reward/punishment.
Special- Paladins for general purposes ignore the unlikeliness of return from good alignment, unfinished obligations almost guarantee return so long as their soul can make the journey (lv and con score above 1)
Npc class- probably not gonna happen
prestige classes- any prestige class requires a significant investment in a characters own life above and beyond normal dedication if they have one of these they are very likely to come back.
Age- less likely to return for every age category passed barring a couple of loopholes impossible after max age, exception Wizards and similar (consider that Wizards are basically magical researchers and likely to have projects going even onto death by old age, that mindset makes for an exception), also children almost never muster the will to come back save special effort (a personal afterlife visit may very well be required for any real chance)
Level- level1 very unlikely improves with level neutral around 10ish
MISC- everything else that might impact the choice falls here
granted u can rule of thumb most unimportant npcs without going through everything, evil above level 1? very likely. good below level 10? very unlikely. neutral below level 10? probably not. Paladin? very likely.
Personally, when I determine whether a good or evil person can come back, I mostly look at how effective they have been at expanding the influence of their alignment. For instance, I think a devil would be loathe to give up that precious divine power that comes from a human soul unless I was reasonably sure that I would get a good return-on-investment. that is to say, If they would lull more people to evil, or provide a situation wherein evil could fester.
“It had been a long, strange night for [our heroes]. One of them finally had his turn at winning. One even something approaching a Character Moment.
You can be damn sure we won’t let ???? like that happen again.”
Ok, that’s gonna bug me… I recognize Mimic’s quote/reference at the end, but I can’t quite place it… The closest I can get is from Ocean’s Eleven, and that’s not it.
Everyone is talking about Mimic, yet no one mentions that Stabs is now MASTERBLASTER!
Rusty and Co – “Beyond Thundergnome”. Two men enter, one man leaves
Miss Goodlaw: We learn little from victory, but much from defeat.
It could be this, http://rustyandco.com/comic/level-7-69/ , but I don’t think so. Yes, Maddie fell into the lava, but she really didn’t learn anything. I think her advice from Zar is yet to come. Which gives us hope for Maddie continuing to be a DiD for Mimic and the gang.
I think that was more the Trident of Warning as she got it before going into the underdark to fight Derro. It would not surprise me for Maddie to learn from defeat in the next level.
Rusty and Co. and rustyandco.com is not affiliated with, endorsed, sponsored, or specifically approved by Wizards of the Coast LLC. For more information about Wizards of the Coast or any of Wizards’ trademarks or other intellectual property, please visit their website at Wizards.com
Consequences.
Pretty grim.
Eh, in a world where you can just pay someone to raise your friend from the dead with nothing more then a body part and some diamond dust (I think that’s still relevant) the consequences are really only as grim as your budget, and I’d say the princess could just loan mimic some money to have her rezzed if he lack the money himself.
She wasn’t even dead at the end of the last chapter. That one was grim, too.
Sure, if the DM allows that. He may be a stickler about the [i]availability[/I] of 5000GP worth of diamond dust. So it could end up being a whole other quest just to obtain that.
Also, he could also do what I would do in that situation, and bring back the System Shock% from AD&D. Death really shouldn’t become a revolving door once the party is high enough levelled to make it so. There should always be the risk of finality, to maintain the players’ incentive to think things through. But maybe that’s just me.
At least in 3.5, there are high-level threats that can’t be come back as easily as death can.
Starting with Raise Dead, problems that you face are: money, death attacks, undeadification, magical aging, level/Constitution loss, not being able to retrieve the body quickly enough (1 day per level of the spellcaster) or at all (TPK?). From there, we move onto Resurrection, which (with an increase in spell level, and an increasing penalty of money) still has the issues of magical aging, level/Constitution loss and not being able to retrieve part of the body (such as the body being put in an extradimensional space, and that space being destroyed), while True Resurrection still falls short in the magical aging and money categories.
That’s not even looking at effects that bypass death and dying entirely. In open game content, we have Trap the Soul, Soul Bind, Temporal Stasis (and its big brother Imprisonment), being Sequester-ed and sent to a secure location, or even being turned into your allies’ enemy with Dominate Monster or Modify Memory (which is why immunity to mind-affecting effects is a priority in many circles).
And if we want to go psionic, there’s Microcosm, Mind Seed (especially a fun one), and the non-mind-affecting Decerebrate.
Notice that I haven’t even gotten into the numerous artifacts printed explicitly for this purpose, or even cursed items like the Bag of Devouring, which has a 50% chance to prevent mortal magic (including wishes, miracles and true resurrections) from reviving a consumed creature.
Death is nothing compared to being stuck in suspended animation in a small sphere deep in the earth forever, only to be found by a 15th-level mage looking expressly for you by name and identity; and only to be freed by a mage two levels higher than that.
Also: If you don’t appreciate the style of game where heroes eventually outgrow death itself, maybe D&D isn’t the game for you? There are many, many alternatives out there.
…and that’s just the *game mechanics*. There’s also the ‘role-playing’ aspect of resu…er, TRYING to resurrect a fallen friend; what if the soul doesn’t want to come back?
Not that they hated the adventuring life, or their companions, but what if the afterlife is SO much BETTER?
Take this example above: a *paladin* has sacrificed her life to ensure a malicious and persistent danger to good people everywhere is FINISHED, *AND* also to save a worthy companion from death. Maddie’s reward in the lawful good outer plane of her chosen deity is gonna be PRETTY SWEET – we’re talking having a feast hall just to herself in Valhalla, for instance.
One campaign had gotten kinda derailed when a party member was slain – he was essential for completing the overall goal, and even though we had done everything else needed (materially) to resurrect him, he just refused to return. It took expensive communing with ‘higher ups’ and eventually a planar adventure to meet him in his paradisaical ‘ever after’ and a lot of hair-pulling and bargaining, reasoning, cajoling, etc. to persuade the player’s soul into returning back to ‘prime’ and finishing what he’d started. In the end, it took persuading the soul’s own god itself to suggest that – while his acts in life were wonderful and perfectly deserving of a richly-rewarded afterlife – it WOULD appreciate him doing MORE. The ‘deal’ was sweetened with basically making the character an avatar of the god – the abilities came in handy in the end – and after the Grand Foozle was destroyed and kingdoms were saved, the character ‘ascended’ and became a demigod in service of the higher deity (and thus transferred to the DM as an NPC).
Of course, this played out over a couple of months of play sessions, and while it sidetracked from the original campaign, became one of the best-liked parts of the whole thing – “yeah, we destroyed a lich…and MADE A GOD, TOO!” ^_^
…so while death might become a ‘revolving door’, nobody said that door had to TURN EASILY or RAPIDLY. 😉
But that would be running away from her responsibilities, and that’s not what paladins do. I can’t imagine her refusing to come back to a world where people need her, from a world where they don’t. It’s called Final Reward for a reason, it’ll still be there later.
Maddie really gone for good?
Don’t be silly. Paladins don’t die, they just go on paid vacations.
Minor to the point of triviality characters have survived death in this comic. Don’t give up hope.
I just hope drama doesn’t decide to make her stay dead.
That drama fellow is such a stick in the mud.
More than one of them were stripped down to bones by Cube and still came back.
Oh no, don’t stop Rusty! I don’t care if you only post a comic twice a year, I really, really love these guys. I understand if real life requires it, but you’re breaking my heart!
It sounds like Mimic wants to get something off his chest!
that was such a terrible pun
I wish i made it….
It’s a moment we should treasure.
Copy that, good buddy!
They’re gonna be pretty disappointed when they realize there’s no treasure left. Air-Looting, more like. It’ll be priceless. Mimic might have to look deep inside himself to find the means to carry off.
Maybe his next adventure hinges on that?
*salute the fallen*
This sounds more like Mimic is going to start considering taking some levels in Paladin, or maybe Cleric, to me.
What class is mimic anyway? He’s shown no combat ability, and I’ve never seen any magic out of him, so what is he!? A warlord or something? Actually, what’s rusty for that matter? I mean, cubes obviously a fighter if some sort, but rusty and mimic haven’t really done anything relevant a to any class.
I’m not sure what Mimics primary class is (Mimic maybe?) but I do recall him taking a level in Beholder (remember his 1 giant eye?)
I think he might have some monk, with that fancy dodging of Grinners stab earlier (or would that be 1-handed swords, what with the fencing and all that?)
Uh-oh… The villain of the next chapter is gonna be Cerebus and his syndrome isn’t it…
Good subversion of Cerebus-syndrome in the last panel.
Could someone just make a Heal check on her already?!
At least cast spare the dying. We don’t know she’s at -10.
“Loot, loot , loot the body…”
What? they’re adventurers, right?
Heal check? On someone with hitpoints beyond -10 (assuming D&D)…she’s already dead.
As for her being dead for good..this system again seems to go by D&D rules…and by it’s rules yes she could very well be gone for good..I hope not but it is possible. Not because they don’t have the ability to bring her back..but because she does not want to come back.
In D&D cosmology, you generally go to somewhere based on your alignment or your god…(I keep hearing it varies :P). Basically Maddy being dead means she is probably in a place where she is essentially rewarded for the life she lived. Living somewhere that ideally lines up nicely with the way she sees things.
And in D&D comming back from a raise dead depends on two things. If they are taken to a gods domain..the god must give their consent…and god or no..the person being raised must actually allow themselves to be raised..they can say no if they like their new home well enough. So the bigger question is..will Maddy see a reason to come back?
I think there is a good chance she’ll want to but, you never know.
You mean she’ll go to a realm of gumdrops, ice cream and puppies with similar airheads?
I won’t say it’ll be just like that…but the realm will in general be in line with how she sees good, evil, law and freedom. Or will be the realm of her god, if she curried their favor enough (IE acted in a manner they like :P).
Not particularly worried about her wanting to come back, shes a paladin. More then almost any other class the core of a paladin’s character is the selflessness to face pain and suffering so that others don’t have to. Even with getting a paradise for an afterlife a good paladin would go right back if someone needed them after all paradise will still be there when they get back, and Maddie is a very good (if somewhat naive) paladin.
WARNING
block o exposition coming u’ve been warned
on a more technical level basically when i try to decide if a NPC would return when raised i consider a few things,
first alignment – evil being WAAAAAY more likely to come back since being the plaything of evil outsiders SUCKS barring somehow swinging a special position in the afterlife (in which case it might switch to somewhat unlikely), neutral slightly unlikely, and good very unlikely (only the good die for good after all). as for the C/N/L axis, Chaos more likely to come back for unfinished personal motivations, Law more likely to come back given unfinished obligations, neutral somewhat less likely to come back.
Then Religion- I don’t take the view that a deity must specifically let a character come back (or else i don’t see much of anyone coming back from the hells) but direct intervention could be made one way or the other in extraordinary times, mostly i take the general feel given toward life and death into account.
Then class-
Any class with a required alignment (a MUST be rather then can’t be) except druids I consider somewhat more likely to return since it shows a stronger then average commitment to their views in regards to their interactions with the world.
special- Druids very unlikely to come back for any non-druid rez (reincarnate vs raise dead shows a huge difference in philosophy) if reincarnate is used moderately more likely
Non-Druid divine casters moderately more likely (part of the point of these people is to take their faith and inspire people toward their god, even if that means they can’t personally be there for abit longer)
Misc Casters/psions- somewhat more likely learning to work your will on the world fosters a degree of distance blindly accepting divine reward/punishment.
Special- Paladins for general purposes ignore the unlikeliness of return from good alignment, unfinished obligations almost guarantee return so long as their soul can make the journey (lv and con score above 1)
Npc class- probably not gonna happen
prestige classes- any prestige class requires a significant investment in a characters own life above and beyond normal dedication if they have one of these they are very likely to come back.
Age- less likely to return for every age category passed barring a couple of loopholes impossible after max age, exception Wizards and similar (consider that Wizards are basically magical researchers and likely to have projects going even onto death by old age, that mindset makes for an exception), also children almost never muster the will to come back save special effort (a personal afterlife visit may very well be required for any real chance)
Level- level1 very unlikely improves with level neutral around 10ish
MISC- everything else that might impact the choice falls here
granted u can rule of thumb most unimportant npcs without going through everything, evil above level 1? very likely. good below level 10? very unlikely. neutral below level 10? probably not. Paladin? very likely.
Personally, when I determine whether a good or evil person can come back, I mostly look at how effective they have been at expanding the influence of their alignment. For instance, I think a devil would be loathe to give up that precious divine power that comes from a human soul unless I was reasonably sure that I would get a good return-on-investment. that is to say, If they would lull more people to evil, or provide a situation wherein evil could fester.
she has to come back. for Derek the Cleric.
To quote Nextwave:
“It had been a long, strange night for [our heroes]. One of them finally had his turn at winning. One even something approaching a Character Moment.
You can be damn sure we won’t let ???? like that happen again.”
What, no mention of Derek the Cleric?
I should have thought he’d be able to placate the god *and* give Madeline a reason to return…
Aww, I wanted to mention him.
Ok, that’s gonna bug me… I recognize Mimic’s quote/reference at the end, but I can’t quite place it… The closest I can get is from Ocean’s Eleven, and that’s not it.
Anyone?
Everyone is talking about Mimic, yet no one mentions that Stabs is now MASTERBLASTER!
Rusty and Co – “Beyond Thundergnome”. Two men enter, one man leaves
She’d make a good Ferra, too. She’s got the knives, at least.
Agreed on oth accounts.
So here is what Zar told each of the ‘Damsels in Distress’ (in order of happening). http://rustyandco.com/comic/level-7-16/
Miss Perkins: Go for the jugular.
Happens here http://rustyandco.com/comic/level-7-29/
Miss Doogan: Remember your magic words.
Happens here http://rustyandco.com/comic/level-7-33/
Miss Casbaugh: A word in the right ear does wonders.
Happens here http://rustyandco.com/comic/level-7-72/
Mister… Russell: Don’t get lead by the nose.
Happens here http://rustyandco.com/comic/level-7-76/
Miss Goodlaw: We learn little from victory, but much from defeat.
It could be this, http://rustyandco.com/comic/level-7-69/ , but I don’t think so. Yes, Maddie fell into the lava, but she really didn’t learn anything. I think her advice from Zar is yet to come. Which gives us hope for Maddie continuing to be a DiD for Mimic and the gang.
I think Maddie learns from ‘defeat’ here: http://rustyandco.com/comic/level-7-60/
I think that was more the Trident of Warning as she got it before going into the underdark to fight Derro. It would not surprise me for Maddie to learn from defeat in the next level.
Question: would Anti-Madeline count as a part of the body for the purposes of resurrection?
Pwhaha! My gods that sure is a mental image.