The Death Penalty

[TheHutz]

My group and I have been playing through Tomb of Annihilation for approaching a year now. It's a slower paced game on the leveling side, with lots of opportunities for power increases in other ways. We are about to head out into the jungle again and begin tier 2 and the topic of death and character re-rolling came up. The general consensus is the group thinks that a backup character starting with the same exp as the dead character is too easy. We have also determined that having the backup character lose all progress gained towards the next level to be too harsh, especially if you're right on the cusp of a level. It can make a player a lot more risk averse in the few 1000 exp right before leveling. Anyone have any good rules they use for re-rolling? It's looking like a flat percentage exp deduction might be our likely answer.

[Trask]

Flat percentage is what I was going to recommend. I used a 10% exp reduction and people were pretty satisfied with it, didnt feel too punishing but it was just enough to be something that you really wanted to avoid.

[KillingTime]

I've always found that attachment to a character is enough of an incentive not to get killed.
Likewise, if you lose a character and it was due to poor party play or a random event it can feel extremely sucky to be doubly punished by losing xp too.
I recommend milestone levelling and keep everyone on the same level regardless.

[Addaran]

I've always found that attachment to a character is enough of an incentive not to get killed.
Likewise, if you lose a character and it was due to poor party play or a random event it can feel extremely sucky to be doubly punished by losing xp too.
I recommend milestone levelling and keep everyone on the same level regardless.

That's also my preference. Sucks to lose a character already, without being penalized.
It can be pretty annoying too if you die because of someone else, or if your teamate has to choose between two PCs who will live.

[KillingTime]

I've always found that attachment to a character is enough of an incentive not to get killed.
Likewise, if you lose a character and it was due to poor party play or a random event it can feel extremely sucky to be doubly punished by losing xp too.
I recommend milestone levelling and keep everyone on the same level regardless.

[Dark.Revenant]

The core rules do not have any rules for what the death penalty should be. Work with your group and come up with a scheme that works for everyone.

If you need an official answer, then that answer is basically “you reroll at level 1.” That’s the only official method used (AL). Obviously, not many groups like this, but it’s the truth.

[Trask]

Theres nothing wrong with a penalty for dead characters, it can be fun. Tomb of Annihilation is expressly billed as a tough module where characters die a lot, being "invested" in your character isnt really what people always want, sometimes they need more mechanical reasons to fear death. I played through TOA without any such penalty myself and it was pretty killer, a LOT of PCs died and eventually people just suicided themselves into stupid stuff for laughs because they didnt care about their character's lives. In such a case, you need a penalty system like this. Its gamey, but its also a gamey way to play. Its fine, and not badwrongfun.

[MaxWilson]

My group and I have been playing through Tomb of Annihilation for approaching a year now. It's a slower paced game on the leveling side, with lots of opportunities for power increases in other ways. We are about to head out into the jungle again and begin tier 2 and the topic of death and character re-rolling came up. The general consensus is the group thinks that a backup character starting with the same exp as the dead character is too easy. We have also determined that having the backup character lose all progress gained towards the next level to be too harsh, especially if you're right on the cusp of a level. It can make a player a lot more risk averse in the few 1000 exp right before leveling. Anyone have any good rules they use for re-rolling? It's looking like a flat percentage exp deduction might be our likely answer.

This will be too harsh for your taste, but you did ask, so...

For sandbox-style campaigns, start over at the minimum campaign level (typically 1st level, sometimes level 1d3), and it's up to you and the party to determine whether to power-level you through hard adventuring in high-level adventures, or make new low-level PCs of their own so you can adventure together, or something else..

For standalone modules a la AD&D campaigns, you can create a new PC at the minimum level range for that module, but the character starts with an XP debt: they have 0 XP, and do not gain a level until they earn enough to reach the next level. E.g. even if you start out at 7th level, you still need to earn 34,000 XP to hit 8th level--it's just that you're 7th level until then instead of 1st level. So, if you're constantly new characters, you'll always be at the minimum level for that adventure, whereas someone who plays the same PC in lots of modules can advance much higher as well as accumulating loot.

[Slipperychicken]

Losing a character is bad enough already. That can pretty much tank your mood for a whole weekend. Mechanical penalties on the replacement are just rubbing salt in the wound.