TIL Jade Phoenix Mages are jerks

[XenoGeno]

I was looking at the Jade Phoenix Mage in Tome of Battle today, and I had a horrible realization. Given the default fluff, there are exactly thirteen JPMs that get reincarnated over and over again, and the moment one of them dies, a new one is born somewhere in the world. That's all well and good, but here's my concern: what happens if that particular JPM gets brought back to life, like with his Emerald Immolation ability? :smalleek:

[justiceforall]

You get the drivel that was that particular story parallel from Buffy the Vampire Slayer?

[Frosty]

You mean Faith?

[CyberThread]

TIL Xeno is a redditor


I request an AMA!

[justiceforall]

You mean Faith?

And the rest of them.

[AuraTwilight]

"From now on, anyone who can be a <Jade Phoenix Mage>, WILL be a <Jade Phoenix Mage>."

[XenoGeno]

Uhhhh... not a Buffy fan (before I got chased out with torches and pitchforks, I enjoyed the first three seasons alright, but not enough to go past that), nor a Redditor, not sure what either one has to do with anything? :smallconfused: I just found it disturbing that by fluff, the JPMs are 13 reincarnating souls; if one dies, that specific person's soul is reborn as a baby, right? So... what happens to the baby when the JPM gets brought back to life? Does it die, or does it technically live but just without a soul? Not to mention other fluff implications, like can undead be made from a JPM, or can a previous incarnation of a specific JPM be brought back with true resurrection? Don't get me wrong, I'm writing down dozens of potential adventure hooks from these ideas, but still, I wanted to see if anyone else sees the implications or am I alone here?

[Sephoris]

Presumably, once a JPM has reincarnated their soul is no longer available to return to their previous body, so any resurrection after that point simply fails. I don't have ToB, so I can only see the SRD stuff, not the fluff, but is it really supposed to be immediate reincarnation? At the very least, it seems like they should get leeway for half a minute or so that they should expect to be dead from Emerald Immolation.

[chainer1216]

there is a pause in the reincarnation cycle, "a few hours or days" where the person can be resurrected, but after that they reincarnate and can no longer be brought back.

its spelled out on page 117, in the "daily life (and death)" section

[Yogibear41]

I would say there is definently some delay maybe even years before they are reborn. I wouldn't worry about it too much though its kinda like wondering what would have happened if the terminator had actually killed John Conner when he was a kid. Good ole time paradoxes and what not. :smallcool:

[Sephoris]

there is a pause in the reincarnation cycle, "a few hours or days" where the person can be resurrected, but after that they reincarnate and can no longer be brought back.

its spelled out on page 117, in the "daily life (and death)" section

That seems more reasonable. It doesn't totally preclude the JPM from getting resurrected, but it does make it a little more urgent.

This is just one of those funky things that comes out of D&D's hodgepodge cosmology. Afterlives and resurrection and reincarnation all thrown together are going to interact weirdly sometimes.

[ArcturusV]

I think the creepier question would be the state of the children. In DnD it seems to be the Soul, not the Body, which has Levels and powers. Otherwise spells like Reincarnate would bring you back as a level 1 humanoid, etc. Rather than being cruise control to immortality with only 1 level loss.

So does that mean when a Jade Pheonix Mage dies... that there is some baby being born who has JPM powers -1 level?

[JoshuaZ]

So does that mean when a Jade Pheonix Mage dies... that there is some baby being born who has JPM powers -1 level?

No. They explicitly don't. They need to relearn and redevelop their abilities. They do however have a class feature that let's them have flashes of memory with information from their previous incarnations.

[XenoGeno]

there is a pause in the reincarnation cycle, "a few hours or days" where the person can be resurrected, but after that they reincarnate and can no longer be brought back.

its spelled out on page 117, in the "daily life (and death)" section

Haha, that's what I get for posting while battling insomnia. :smallredface:

For what it's worth, the third paragraph in the introduction to the class says, "The instant a one dies, a new one is born somewhere in the world." (emphasis mine) So, I guess this is a case of text trumping text? :smallamused:

[Psyren]

You have to draw the line between fluff text and rules at some point. I don't think Emerald Immolation triggers the reincarnation.

Even if you did consider it to be rules however - because EI specifies that you come back exactly as you left, this more specific form of death would therefore trump the general rule about JPM rebirth

Also, the adaptation lets you tweak things even further.

[Blackhawk748]

I am reminded of Silverfox from Memories of Ice from the Malazan series........ oh this sounds like a sweet character concept

[XenoGeno]

You have to draw the line between fluff text and rules at some point. I don't think Emerald Immolation triggers the reincarnation.

Even if you did consider it to be rules however - because EI specifies that you come back exactly as you left, this more specific form of death would therefore trump the general rule about JPM rebirth

Also, the adaptation lets you tweak things even further.

Well yes, you can always adjust the fluff, but that's a lot less fun. :smalltongue: Besides, looking at weird fluff-and-rules interactions has long been one of my best sources of inspiration for coming up with hooks. Even with the clarified fluff, I've gotten one or two solid hooks out of this.

Although now I have a genuine rules question; can you use EI to get out of the instant death from the Wu Jen spell Transcend Mortality? I saw it floated around as a combo they can use, but now I'm not so sure; the spell text explicitly says nothing can prevent the caster from being disintegrated. Wouldn't using EI cause the JPM to explode, reform, and then immediately crumble into ash?

[Chronos]

There's a delay before you come back from Emerald Immolation. You have to time it so that the duration of Transcend Mortality runs out during that delay. So it goes something like this:

1: You cast Transcend Mortality. Your life-clock is now running.
2: You fight for a while with TM up.
3: You immolate yourself emeraldly, and reduce your body to ash.
4: The duration runs out on Transcend Mortality, and reduces your body to ash again.
5: You re-form from your ash.

[Psyren]

Well yes, you can always adjust the fluff, but that's a lot less fun. :smalltongue:

"Adjusting fluff" was the very last part of my post. Did you read the rest?

[Prime32]

You could go for the "Schrodinger's Reincarnation" route. When a JPM dies, one or more children with similar souls are born with the potential to become their reincarnation, taking on traits of the original gradually. They only truly count as a reincarnation once they've been awakened by another JPM. If the original is resurrected first, the children are unaffected (at most, they stop having weird dreams).

See the Nerevarine from Morrowind (and maybe some real-world sects but I'm not completely sure about that, and the rules wouldn't let me go into detail anyway)

[Yuki Akuma]

You could go for the "Schrodinger's Reincarnation" route. When a JPM dies, one or more children with similar souls are born with the potential to become their reincarnation, taking on traits of the original gradually. They only truly count as a reincarnation once they've been awakened by another JPM. If the original is resurrected first, the children are unaffected (at most, they stop having weird dreams).

See the Nerevarine from Morrowind (and maybe some real-world sects but I'm not completely sure about that, and the rules wouldn't let me go into detail anyway)

I like this idea. Not just for JPM, but in general. I may have to steal it.

[Chronos]

Hey, here's a question: Suppose that Mr. Fawkes was a legendary epic-level Jade Phoenix Mage of ages past. Eventually, though, even he met his match, and died during an invasion of the Abyss, on the 73,243rd layer. He then got reincarnated as Mr. Hatchling, who unfortunately had worse luck, and only made it as far as the first level of the prestige class.

Now, a party of do-gooders has decided that they need help from the days of legend, and has cast True Resurrection for Mr. Fawkes. And as luck would have it, they cast it mere minutes after Mr. Hatchling happened to die, so the soul is available. Which incarnation of the JPM do they get back?

[AuraTwilight]

They're specifically reviving Mr. Fawkes, so that's who they get back.

[Yogibear41]

They get whichever version the DM wants them to have ha ha. :smallsmile:

[XenoGeno]

There's a delay before you come back from Emerald Immolation. You have to time it so that the duration of Transcend Mortality runs out during that delay. So it goes something like this:

1: You cast Transcend Mortality. Your life-clock is now running.
2: You fight for a while with TM up.
3: You immolate yourself emeraldly, and reduce your body to ash.
4: The duration runs out on Transcend Mortality, and reduces your body to ash again.
5: You re-form from your ash.

I really don't think that's clear cut at all. TM explicitly says there's no way to avoid the death from the effect, no exceptions given. If direct divine intervention can't stop it, I feel like as soon as he reforms, the JPM dies again and is reduced to ash, and can only come back from [true] resurrection.


"Adjusting fluff" was the very last part of my post. Did you read the rest?

Yes, and didn't have much to say about it either way. My only real comment on any part of your post was that I feel "adjusting fluff" is a boring answer given this conversation is about silly rules and fluff interactions.

[chainer1216]

you could always dip archmage, get transcend mortality as a spell like ability, then cast body outside body, and have the clones use the transcend mortality spell-like.

[Chronos]

I really don't think that's clear cut at all. TM explicitly says there's no way to avoid the death from the effect, no exceptions given.
You're not avoiding it; you're just making it irrelevant. You die, and then you die again, and then you come back from the dead. Dying twice is no different, in practice, from dying once. The death from TM can't wait until after EI re-forms you, because it can't be delayed by any means, either.