PC returns after month hiatus

[HMS Invincible]

I have a cavalier pc coming back after missing a month or 2-5 sessions. I'm not sure how to resolve or resume his quest line satisfactorily.

His plot. Humans are at war with dwarves. pc cavalier sides with humans. Pc dwarf sides with dwarfs. Since pc cav was gone due to personal issues, PC dwarf swayed the plot to his side. I thought it was unfair to resolve the plot to the dwarfs if PC cav is coming back.

If no further action is taken, then dwarfs gain allies to defeat the humans. There was an option to sabotage the dwarves ally but the PC cav wasn't here. Is there or should I provide a way for PC cav to help the humans?
Or should I let the chips fall and bring up the plot line again when the dwarven alliance pushes into the humans? The war zone is 20 day sailing away in an island chain campaign. Warzone is on a single island not central to the plot.

Tldr what options would the PC cav try and expect out of the me the dm?

[Red Fel]

Did you work out the hiatus in advance? What I mean is, did the player say, "Hey, I need to be gone for a month, can I pick up when I get back?" Or did the player leave the group, without giving the impression of returning?

Context matters. If a player leaves the group and an understanding that he will return exists, then it's fair and right to work him back into the plot somehow. But if he simply ditched, even if he did it politely, it's not fair to the remaining players to assume he can just hop right back in as if nothing happened.

My instinct, even if he gave notice, is to let the chips fall where they may. It's not unreasonable to say, "Yes, I know you were gone, but the plot kept moving without you. We kept your seat open, but you're going to have to play some catch-up."

[HMS Invincible]

There was no notice, he simply didn't show up for several sessions. As a rule, I put PCs who aren't there in a safe but nearby holding pattern so a PC can jump back in.

I've bee hearing he's depressed or angry at us which is why he ditched. Either way, it's not my place to pry. But then he told us he wants to keep playing.

The dwarf PC is understanding of the circumstances but wants to know the result of his plans.

There's also a human npc agent in limbo due to human PC being gone. Not quite sure what to with him besides reporting on human PC's failure to act (punishing ooc actions in game?)

[Red Fel]

You're not punishing OOC actions. You're moving the plot along. It's one thing to say "Your PC is in a holding pattern and will be here when you return," it's quite another to say "And he kept doing what you were doing and was reasonably successful."

You agreed to hold his character for him. Fine. But you never agreed to hold up the plot. It moved on. The dwarf kept playing, and now he's taken the lead. Proceed with that. The human PC can expect to have his character when he returns, but he shouldn't expect that any actions were taken on his behalf during his unannounced absence.

[DireSickFish]

Yeah I wouldn't give him an out to sway things back to his side. That just invalidates the dwarf players decisions and commitments. If the returning player is very clever and can come up with something wholecloth to sway things then I'd allow that, but I wouldn't throw plot hooks at him. The tide is already flowing in the dwarfs favor, takes a lot of work to sway back and is most likely impossible.

I may include a way for him to ease into agreeing with the dwarven side of things. So that he doesn't see the situation as a complete loss and get grouchy over not being able to do anything. Perhaps there are some pro-dwarf humans that prefer to live in there society, so that helping the dwarves is helping a more reasonable side. Or now that the humans backs are against the wall they have taken an agressive isolationist stance and don't want anything to do with any other races, some innocent elves are caught in the crossfire.

Something to make him more comfortable with the change and keep the party cohesive.

[HMS Invincible]

I know the dwarf PC painted the human side as nazis. encouraginh the human PC to join the dwarf is possible but they put off how they are going to resolve it before. I'm not sure if I should be pushing the pc's to pick a side.

If you were in the human PC shoes, what would you do? Easy answer is do nothing until gm brings it up.
Hard option. What would a loyal human do?

[The_Werebear]

Part of it depends on what you said the absent PC was doing when he was gone. If he was being controlled by you in fights, then it will be harder as his actions are known by the party. But, if you had him idling in a tavern or leaving the island, he could have been reporting in on the dwarf to a Human allied spymaster or doing a few solo missions for his preferred side.

Alternately, if the PC is ok with a new character, the Cavalier could turn on party and the returning player could make a Dwarf sympathetic character to fit the new group dynamic.

[HMS Invincible]

Part of it depends on what you said the absent PC was doing when he was gone. If he was being controlled by you in fights, then it will be harder as his actions are known by the party. But, if you had him idling in a tavern or leaving the island, he could have been reporting in on the dwarf to a Human allied spymaster or doing a few solo missions for his preferred side.

Alternately, if the PC is ok with a new character, the Cavalier could turn on party and the returning player could make a Dwarf sympathetic character to fit the new group dynamic.

I left it vague on purpose. It's assumed to be in a safe nearby hiding place unless retroactively specified by the players.

Him making npc and a new character was a potential resolution. The Other possibility is he does something unforeseen. Like warn the human side or send them aid/special tech.

[Vitruviansquid]

The plot goes where the plot went because that's the plot everybody's seen. You should only ever use retcon as a last resort because frequent retconning of your campaign breaks down the illusion that what your players do matters (since it can be changed later anyways), cheapening the entire experience. Whatever the party agreed to do while the human was gone should be respected - that ship has sailed. Now, if your human player decides this isn't good enough for him, and that you need to retcon the situation to respect what his character would've wanted even though he wasn't there for the actual game at the time and he didn't make his wishes known beforehand... well, I'd say the DM and the group has compromised enough to even hold onto his character for him while he went AWOL, and it's time the player bent a bit.

As for what the human's been doing this whole time...

I suppose the mature approach is to work it out between the player and the DM in private, and then present the storyline to the group at the next session.

HOWEVER, the hilarious and possibly cathartic approach is to rule that the AWOL'd player's character was doing something embarrassing and pathetic while he was gone, like he'd briefly become addicted to a certain disgustingly greasy fast food and became too ungainly and unhealthy to fight or ride a horse.

[HMS Invincible]

The plot goes where the plot went because that's the plot everybody's seen. You should only ever use retcon as a last resort because frequent retconning of your campaign breaks down the illusion that what your players do matters (since it can be changed later anyways), cheapening the entire experience. Whatever the party agreed to do while the human was gone should be respected - that ship has sailed. Now, if your human player decides this isn't good enough for him, and that you need to retcon the situation to respect what his character would've wanted even though he wasn't there for the actual game at the time and he didn't make his wishes known beforehand... well, I'd say the DM and the group has compromised enough to even hold onto his character for him while he went AWOL, and it's time the player bent a bit.

As for what the human's been doing this whole time...

I suppose the mature approach is to work it out between the player and the DM in private, and then present the storyline to the group at the next session.

HOWEVER, the hilarious and possibly cathartic approach is to rule that the AWOL'd player's character was doing something embarrassing and pathetic while he was gone, like he'd briefly become addicted to a certain disgustingly greasy fast food and became too ungainly and unhealthy to fight or ride a horse.

It's only been like a month in session. Anyway, I misspoke about the retconning, I meant I keep it vague as to any missing PC's whereabouts and actions so the PCs can't rely on "well so and so afk player can do this for us". Once the player returns, I'll explain what afk player was doing to fill in the established gaps.

As for the returning player, I'm going to give him an info dump on what the rest of the party is doing, and what happened in the campaign. This means he knows the following 'quests' in terms of immediacy.
1. Party wants to claim a war torn island for themselves because one of the PC's is from there.
2. There's a dragon out for revenge because the party killed another dragon.
3. Alcaz Navy is in a diplomatic dispute/blockading(separately) Ruby Island.

The plan is to make him deal with those quests first. It'll be up to him to bring up any of his character plot arcs below.
1. PC Cavalier's failure to prevent the Dwarf + Alcaz Navy Alliance.
2. PC Cavalier's homeland is at war with PC Dwarf's homeland...how does that affect their in game relationships.
Now if he does bring up his plot arcs, I'll tell him the alliance is sealed, and pause for a second. If he doesn't bring up anything, I move on with the main plot, and invade PC Cav's homeland later as a B-plot point. He can then get an urgent quest to defend his homeland.

What do you think? If the PC acts as predicted, I'll have several sessions before the interparty homeland conflict becomes a pressing issue.