Lycanthropy curse homebrew ruling too punishing?

[KittenEV]

So my players are investigating a werewolf den which in old elf ruins. As you can guess, one of the party has come down with the "sickness" per say. I.E. got bit and now has the lycanthropy curse.

I'm thinking of ruling different than the book, but don't know if it's too punishing for the player in question. My rule is as follows: The curse takes holds over the course of 3 days. And at any point, they can get remove curse from a cleric (which my party does not have unforunately) During that time, each day the player will make a constitution saving throw with a DC 10. If save, the final DC is lowered by 2. If fail, the final DC is upped by 2.

The final DC on day 3 has an orginal DC of 10 and then add or subtract previous fails or saves for new DC. At which time, the player will make one final roll and if they fail, the curse is too powerful for them and they die. If they succeed, they are now a werewolf?

Too punishing or severe? I'm new to DMing so I'm looking for some input. I wanted to make it more interesting than just to have one bite and suddenly the player is a werewolf etc.

[Puh Laden]

It's not too punishing considering the default is that the player character becomes a potential enemy every full moon, unless they embrace the curse, then well, they're not exactly the same person after that. Really, the only issue I'd have with it is that it's more boring. If I'm going to lose my character, I think I'd rather lose them in such a way that an interesting development comes of it. Though other players might rather have their character die than to be transformed into a monster.

If I were DMing this situation (In the context of running the curse as written in the book), I would talk it over with the player whose character this affects and see what input they have. Would the character resist the curse or embrace it? If they'd embrace it, I'd ask "what would the werewolf-ified version of your character want?" If you're concerned about it pulling too much focus from your current plans, you could maybe let the player remain in control of the character until a proper break in the action, at which point the character's goals become irreconcilably opposed to the party's. Then the party could either try to get their friend back or try to kill that character, or both, or ignore them until they cross paths again.

To me, running it with additional saves can be interesting if narrated with phrases like "you break out into a cold sweat in the middle of the night, roll a Constitution save." And if they're going to run into a lot of werewolves it would probably be a good idea or else the whole party could be werewolves by the end of it. But dying on a failure just sounds like a wasted opportunity to me. I would probably have it that if you fail three time, you become a werewolf and if you succeed three times you don't but I'd only be that nice if they're going to be fighting a lot of werewolves.

[busterswd]

Anything that can cause instant death for lower level parties should probably be avoided; just 1 or two bad rolls could randomly kill off the player, without any possible interaction. It's akin to throwing a party in jail and taking away all their gear; while the idea can work, it can easily lead to an unpleasant session for the player.

How much do they actually know about the curse and how to solve it? How easy is it to find a 5th level cleric? If it's relatively easy to figure out what the curse is (and the player can tell something is wrong), and relatively easy to fix it, then it may be fine; I still think permadeath is too binary of a penalty, though. Maybe make the penalty the difference between losing control near full moons vs. being able to control the form? The story continues, there's a negative to failing, but the player doesn't outright lose the character.

In terms of number crunching, DC 10, with two previous rolls to raise/lower it. Is the player proficient in Con saves? Do they have a decent Con score?


Assuming they have a modifier of +2 (proficiency OR 14 in con), their chance of failing a DC 10 save is 35%, with failures or successes changing the final value by 10%. So their chance of death is:

3 Failures + 2 Save -> Fail + 1 Fail/1 Save, Last Fail

(.35 * .35 * .55) + (.65 * .65 * .15) + (2 * .35 * .65 * .35) = 29%, roughly a 3/10 chance of death with +2 Con. 0 Con is a 43% chance of death.



Edit: Corrected math.

[Typhon]

When is the next full moon?

Times like this are when I really like my copies of the the Van Richten guides. Lots of good advice for how to roleplay the curse and how to handle being a lycanthrope after the curse takes hold.

I agree with busterswd though, having death be such a quick result for non-assimilation of a magical curse seems very Underworld-ish. I think a take more inline with "An American Werewolf in London" and "The Howling" (no sequels only the original movies) handles much better for RP purposes and development.

[Envyus]

I think it works best by default. If the character rejects the curse. They don't gain any of it's benefits in their normal form, and every full moon turn into a crazy werewolf but they stay the same person at all other times. If they accept the curse then they gain control of it and can shape shift at will. But they turn into an evil ******* 24/7.

[Contrast]

I agree with busterswd, this seems to have a quite high potential to just result in one of your players dying in a rather unfun way. Would they even know about the curse in character to know they should be trying to find someone to get cured?

Try to think about what you're trying to achieve (I assume killing your players off is not it) and work backwards from that.

[Honest Tiefling]

I think the death aspect isn't bad because its too severe, because that depends on your group. How frequent is character death? The problem is, it's the end of a story. Sure, tragedy is a necessary part of story telling, but you can kill NPCs and PCs alike too often.

Consider a fail state that isn't death, but as brutal as your group likes it. Perhaps if they keep failing the save, it DOES begin to wreck their body as their two natures and they are weakened. Heck, some people would be annoyed enough if their character started to spout fur and had contorted muscles (no disguise for you!). You could even pepper in some minor bonuses, so the player feels that it's a challenge...But one to overcome, not one that basically means roll a new character. Could add in some mental quirks if your group is big on roleplaying.

[Typhon]

Consider a fail state that isn't death, but as brutal as your group likes it. Perhaps if they keep failing the save, it DOES begin to wreck their body as their two natures and they are weakened.

I like where this is going. This has potential to really develop into a great party story of its own. Consider having their characters shift in alignment as each (possible character) one tries to come to understanding. Becoming evil loving the power and bloodshed, or broken trying to tame the beast within.