[PF] Paladin: Cheapest and Earliest way to bring back dead players?

[Hytheter]

So Paladins can get a feat called Ultimate Mercy (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/general-feats/ultimate-mercy). This let's them use ten uses of Lay on Hands to cast Raise Dead. I find it particularly interesting for 2 reasons:

1. It's dirt cheap. Instead of paying the material component, you can instead just suffer a negative level which goes away after 24 hours. You'll still need to cough up 2000gp to restore the negative levels of the target, but that's obviously nothing on the usual 5000gp for a normal Raise Dead or the sharply increasing costs for it's later equivalents.

2. It can be gotten very early. The feat itself can be snagged at level 5, although you likely won't have enough Lay on Hands to actually use it. you have 4 levels to boost that up before the Cleric can even learn the spell.

So outside of buying a scroll or other magic item, is there any possible to raise the dead any earlier than this? And including items, is there a cheaper way?
Alternately, what is the earliest we can get this trick to work? Can we somehow get up to 10 Lay on Hands when we first qualify for the feat at Level 5?

[Vanitas]

A venerable aasimar with a +2 item would have Cha 26 at level 5, for exactly 10 uses of lay on hands.

+1 lay on hands is one of the possible ressonance abilities from a wayfinder. This depends on luck, but many ioun stones are affordable at level 5. If you are indeed lucky enough, taking Extra Lay On Hands and the wayfinder ability you can get by with Cha 20. If you only take Extra Lay On Hands, it's still doable at Cha 22 (start with 20 and get a +2 item).

Looks doable.

[grarrrg]

A venerable aasimar with a +2 item would have Cha 26 at level 5, for exactly 10 uses of lay on hands.

+1 lay on hands is one of the possible ressonance abilities from a wayfinder. This depends on luck, but many ioun stones are affordable at level 5. If you are indeed lucky enough, taking Extra Lay On Hands and the wayfinder ability you can get by with Cha 20. If you only take Extra Lay On Hands, it's still doable at Cha 22 (start with 20 and get a +2 item).

Excluding the Venerable, it looks like level 7.
Ultimate Mercy requires Greater Mercy. Greater Mercy can be taken at level 3 at the earliest. Extra Lay on Hands needs Lay on Hands of course, and can be taken at level 3 at the earliest.
So unless you are _really_ boosting your CHA, you simply won't have enough feats to do it until level 7.

[Stux]

So unless you are _really_ boosting your CHA, you simply won't have enough feats to do it until level 7.

By which point, of course, Druid's have Reincarnate as an option without having to use any feats or make any other specific build choices.

[BWR]

If you've found a way to bring dead players back from the dead you will pretty much be the most famous person ever.

And for some reason every player I've come across has considered Reincarnation to be nothing but a joke option, so build heavy, but very useful.

[Nihilarian]

The Sacred Servant archetype can gain bonus uses of Lay On Hands.

[Kudaku]

I designed a Warrior of the Holy Light paladin that could get Ultimate Mercy at level 4 - I believe it is entirely rules-legal, though it does use the optional retraining rules:

1. Human Paladin, 20 charisma base, takes whatever as a feat. 0 LoHs.
2. Human paladin, earns Lay on Hands. Retrain starting feat to Extra Lay On Hands. 5 (charisma) +2 (feat) +1 (level) = 8 LoHs.
3. Human paladin, Retrain (other) starting feat to Greater Mercy.
4. Human paladin. Retrain 3rd level feat to Ultimate Mercy. 9 LoHs from levels, feats and charisma, one bonus from archetype. 10 LoHs.

I'm not a big fan of this feat. On the one hand Raise Dead spells should (hopefully) rarely be needed by the party, so it provides a minor benefit to the party itself. However the ability to apply Raise Dead at no cost very early on will heavily derail many storylines, and provides some very troubling questions for the campaign world at large.

I had a paladin in a campaign use his LoH charges each downtime day to resurrect one person (eventually multiple people) who died from an accident, violence etc for free in whatever city he was in. Unsurprisingly, he was quickly a very sought-after person.

It's one of those feats that provides a minor benefit to the character and party but really, really shakes up the campaign world if you think it through and apply it on a large scale.

Edit: Corrected progression as per Grarrrg's post.

[grarrrg]

2. Human paladin, earns Lay on Hands. Retrain starting feats to Greater Mercy and Extra Lay On Hands. 5 (charisma) +2 (feat) +1 (level) = 8 LoHs.
3. Human paladin, takes Ultimate Mercy.

Move "retrain to Greater Mercy" to level 3, and add "retrain X to Ultimate Mercy" at level 4 and you're good. [/nitpick]

[Kudaku]

Move "retrain to Greater Mercy" to level 3, and add "retrain X to Ultimate Mercy" at level 4 and you're good. [/nitpick]

Ah, the mercy requirement. Good catch! There was something niggling in the back of my head when I typed that up but I couldn't put my finger on it. Editing my post now.

[Hytheter]

By which point, of course, Druid's have Reincarnate as an option without having to use any feats or make any other specific build choices.

I totally forgot about Reincarnate

Although it's fairly likely to give some... unfortunate... side effects. It's also about 50% more pricey, but as you said doesn't have a feat tax.



I had a paladin in a campaign use his LoH charges each downtime day to resurrect one person (eventually multiple people) who died from an accident, violence etc for free in whatever city he was in. Unsurprisingly, he was quickly a very sought-after person.

That sounds totally awesome to me. :P

[Kudaku]

That sounds totally awesome to me. :P

The player had a great time with it, though I couldn't quite help but throw in some twists. Came back wrong (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CameBackWrong) and all...

[Hytheter]

Hmmm... do temporary boosts to Charisma grant extra uses of Lay on Hands? If so, it could be possible to get enough uses at Level 5 with help from a friend who can cast Eagle's Splendor. Though you'd need to be a Warrior of the Holy Light and have at least 17 Charisma before racial boosts...


The player had a great time with it, though I couldn't quite help but throw in some twists. Came back wrong (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CameBackWrong) and all...

Haha fair enough

[Kudaku]

Hmmm... do temporary boosts to Charisma grant extra uses of Lay on Hands? If so, it could be possible to get enough uses at Level 5 with help from a friend who can cast Eagle's Splendor. Though you'd need to be a Warrior of the Holy Light and have at least 17 Charisma before racial boosts...

Like spell slots and most other charge/day abilities, lay on hands does not grant extra charges from a temporary charisma bonus unless that bonus lasts more than 24 hours.

That said, it's perfectly possible to have 10 uses of LoH at level 5.

The Bracers of the Mercyful Knight and the Bracelet of Mercy both increase LoH uses, but are relatively pricy for the effect. Both can be found in the Ultimate Equipment guide.

[Stux]

I totally forgot about Reincarnate

Although it's fairly likely to give some... unfortunate... side effects. It's also about 50% more pricey, but as you said doesn't have a feat tax.

Yeah, if you were considering using Reincarnate it is always worth having a chat about it with your DM first. Its usefulness depends a bit on where your DM rests on the Malicious <-> Coddling scale. Some will be happy for you to just keep the same race, given you have to take that 2 permanent negative level hit (which will sometimes be more than a DM will make you take for rolling a new character). Other DMs might intentionally fudge rolls to give you an 'hilarious' new race!

[CTrees]

Yeah, if you were considering using Reincarnate it is always worth having a chat about it with your DM first. Its usefulness depends a bit on where your DM rests on the Malicious <-> Coddling scale. Some will be happy for you to just keep the same race, given you have to take that 2 permanent negative level hit (which will sometimes be more than a DM will make you take for rolling a new character). Other DMs might intentionally fudge rolls to give you an 'hilarious' new race!

I had a goblin PC Reincarnate. Having the player roll on the standard table seems like a fair default option (so if they get something odd, it's kinda their fault). The party actually convinced me to let the guy roll against the entire first Bestiary, because they were all in favor of the possibility of "hilarious" outcomes. With the caveat that I was vetoing anything too strange (no reincarnating into the Tarrasque), I had the guy roll 3d100 and turn to that page number (I think it's 286 pages of monsters, so we were ignoring any out-of-range rolls). You know what he rolled? Out of the ENTIRE Bestiary? Goblin. Same darn race as he started.

[Spore]

I had a goblin PC Reincarnate. Having the player roll on the standard table seems like a fair default option (so if they get something odd, it's kinda their fault). The party actually convinced me to let the guy roll against the entire first Bestiary, because they were all in favor of the possibility of "hilarious" outcomes. With the caveat that I was vetoing anything too strange (no reincarnating into the Tarrasque), I had the guy roll 3d100 and turn to that page number (I think it's 286 pages of monsters, so we were ignoring any out-of-range rolls). You know what he rolled? Out of the ENTIRE Bestiary? Goblin. Same darn race as he started.

This makes me wish to kill my character in a group with an Druid on board... or some other characters would have ... mishaps. :belkar: