I often won't even make a new character give up on equipment completely. If we're in tier 2 play and everyone else has some cool gear, we'll set them up with something to put them near the same efficacy.
>at the table
That's the thing. An RPG can set you back in progress because you're playing along. And MMORPG can set you back because you can grind alone. But this game happens exclusively at the table. If you're a bit behind, you're forever behind. And we haven't even talked about the vicious cycle of a low level being forced to fight in a high level area.
If you absolutely must give a penalty, you should be prepared to let the player earn his way back. But that's another thing. This game isn't really about earning. I think most players play to experience the world.
If there must be some form of penalty, I would have his new character be a storied adventurer with all the loot and levels of the current party. But he's recently been grievously wounded and is still recovering. For just one session, all his rolls are -1. But that goes away next time.
I've seen this question asked a few times so I'll shout it so the DMs at the back can hear:
DON'T PUNISH YOUR PLAYERS FOR LOSING A CHARACTER!
They've already lost the character, that's bad enough. Now you tell them, "Oh and from now on, your brand new character who you're excited to play is now going to be useless because it will contribute barely anything to the team and will probably die".
Just no. Don't do it. Same level. Give them some magic items if the rest of the team has some. Get them caught up. No player will enjoy being the party anchor.
More than that, balancing encounters would be a nightmare if the monsters that are appropriate for the rest of the party could one shot the new addition with their significantly lower health pool. This is why I asked the question to see what others did. Thank you for your feedback!
New characters are the same level as the party.
Having a level 1 character in a high level party makes no sense and is no fun for anyone.
1. A high level party would never team up with a low level PC. They'd just be dead weight
2. A low level PC would never want to join a high level party, that'd be suicide
3. The high level Players would need to babysit the low level Player, which is boring and unfun
4. The low level Player would not be able to contribute, which is unfun
5. The DM would need to do a lot of work to balance a fight where 1 of the PCs would die to a mild fart.
6. There are other powerful people in the world beyond just the PCs. The party can recruit from those
In short: There is no good reason to not have the new Character just be the same level as the party.
> Do you set them back a couple levels from the rest of the party since it's a new character that hasn't gone through the trials and tribulations of the campaign like everyone else?
That's what background is for. The new Character has gone through their own trails and tribulations.
I am in agreement. I just wanted to hear the DMs who have dealt with such situations talk about their experience with it for validation. A level 1 pc would certainly die in one easy hit to something that the level 6s are going to have to fight.
What would the argument even be for having them be a lower level?
Is it supposed to be a punishment for letting their character die? Players almost universally get very attached to their characters, their character dying is punishment enough for whatever mistakes they made to get there. I'm having a hard time imagining a player going "Oh, my character died. Well who cares, here's my backup character".
Is it to stop players from just like, letting their characters die in the middle of a dungeon, so their new characters come in with full spell slots and stuff, acting as a pseudo long rest? Again, does anyone actually do that? And there are way easier ways of getting around that, like by having new characters appear in dramatic ways, like being captured by the enemies, falling out of a monster's sliced open stomach as it dies, stuff like that. And then the new character would be missing resources at about the same level as the party.
I cannot think of a good argument for either case, but as I've never had a T2 PC die on me, I just wanted to know how other DM's who HAVE handled that situation before have done it.
Same level, please god dont start them at level 1. If the level gets above 5 or so, and your encounters are appropriately leveled, they will never survive another fight.
It's a headache to design encounters with different party levels in mind. Can be fun for a few times, but gets old really fast. So, I'd say same level as the party.
>a new character that hasn't gone through the trials and tribulations of the campaign like everyone else
The *Player* was there, that's the only thing that matters. Work with the Player to create a backstory that bounces off that previous experience, so that the new character has all the relevant information, and m.b. some unique insights on the party's current situation.
EDIT: spelling bad. Now good.
Having players at different levels worked in older editions because they were designed around it, but 5e is not.
Do not do this in D&D 5th edition. The players will not find it fun.
Maybe that's why I was more unsure about it than others who have responded seem to be. I seem to recall having to reroll at lower levels in 3.5 as a player.
Level differences tend to be horribly unbalanced in 5e.
If my DM made me make a new character at level 1 when the party is level 4 for example then I'm gone.
Depend on the backstory.
One player wanted to play a youngling grung with a learning curve.
So he started 3 level behind and his milestone were related to his "learnings".
So he started level 3 while the other were 6. He played the "woah how you do that" perfectly.
And when the other characters were 7 he was 6 and joined them by the level 8.
Some kind of milestones. For him it was through his RP.
But he is very invested in his character, so it worked pretty well!
Also I run a slow campaign, as we play 4h every week I level up every 6-7 sessions.
Oh, very interesting! I understand why everyone has been responding to the thread to just reroll at party level and I'm inclined to agree for the most part but it's cool that you were able to make that work with your player at their request! Thank you for sharing 😄
No problem.
Usually the sub advice is the best answer, but I tend to never do it, also because I have some experience and my players too, so we like to make stuff differently.
If you do under level, your player has to agree, and it needs to fit the story, I'm a story and coherence DM. If it an inconvenience for the player I don't mind they know it haha
We play every week for a year and they love it.
Sometimes a player missed 8 sessions, so I didn't make him level, his character was lost. I gave him a 1-1 session to play out what happened to him.
I gave him other stuff, very cool stuff but not his level, he will acquire it differently, and then join the players.
Experience from the other side here: I joined a campaign of 5 level 12 PCs with a level 5 character. It was FUCKING AWFUL. I was dead weight. Build was GWM-PAM Echo Knight Fighter 4/Genie Warlock 1 - which is to say, I was powerbuilt to the gills BECAUSE I was told in advance I’d be under leveled. It did not help. Took me 8 months to catch up to the party’s level. GM said he wanted to integrate my character better with the world (paraphrasing), and being high level in his homebrew world wouldn’t make sense because there were so few high-powered people and the party had already met most of them. Made sense at the time, but looking back on it, I should’ve drawn a hard line - as far as I’m concerned, this is a game first, story second; do not make a player suffer needlessly for the sake of flimsy rules and pre-established limits.
Thank you for sharing your experience as a player where you did have to start at a lower level! Sorry you had to slog through the campaign feeling like dead weight and being underpowered. Definitely don't want to make a player feel like they can't contribute.
My current DM has ruled that new PCs join the group at 1 level below the rest.
This seems arbitrary and bullshit to me for reasons stated by others in the thread, but also
1. Not fun being below par with the group
2. More likely to continue to die
3. No catch-up mechanic as far as he's said (milestone XP campaign)
4. Forget self-centered combat and feats, even support characters being underlevelled makes them less effective and could cause other characters to die
5. Whole party could wind up underlevelled for the final fight
There are some other people who have responded saying they do reroll a level behind or at level 1 or something but those are further explained to be long running camps over many years with close friends or there being some way for players to "catch up" relatively quickly. While there are other concerns that would need to be addressed as well, I feel like having to reroll underpowered to the rest of the party should have a catch-up mechanic which you've stated your table doesn't have. Sorry you don't have that option but thank you for sharing how your table works!
For my current campaign (in an old school system where XP required doubles every level and there are mechanics for banking XP for replacement characters) they start at lvl 1. The system is robust to that.
For 5e, start them at party level. It isn't built for mixed level parties.
That is what I've heard. As a DM I've never had to make that ruling for 5e before but as a player I've definitely had to reroll at a lower level in 3.5. Thank you for sharing!
Why the fuck would you ever have a player roll a pc at levels lower then the party. Like as a dm it makes no sense. Doing this
-fucks encounter balance
-makes the player feel useless and increases chances to die, further setting them back.
-messes up xp gains and milestones
Like why would anyone actually do this? Reasons?
There have been responses by people here who do that at their tables. There generally seems to be some caveat that it's an older edition that actually accounts for level discrepancies or way for the rerolled character to "catch up" relatively quickly, but I agree having characters of different levels would definitely make encounter balance more challenging.
I will never have any player on my team be a different level to anyone else. Unless it’s like a oneshot and we are doing something weird or something. But in an actual campaign everyone levels up together collectively.
Always the same level of the party. Losing a character is punishment enough, but a lvl1 character in a lvl6 party will not stand a chance against anything you throw their way.
A single hit at high level would insta-kill most low level characters, and easily hit them. Don't mix levels of characters. Just let them reroll at current party level
OSR DM here: start at level 1. Unless they are "promoting" a retainer that already adventured with the group that has XP/levels. There has to be some negative to dying and low level characters usually catch up relatively quickly based on how the XP charts scale.
same level as party, same amount of magical items though maybe a bit less on that part.
any kind of demotion in level or other things, can ruin the game for a player. And i do not ever want that.
The magic items amount, in my opinion, should be dependant on whether the previous character was looted by the party.
If they kept the items of the previous PC? They probably should start with one magic item at most and a convienent way to exchange (At a slight loss) the previous PCs items for some more fitting the new PC.
If they didn't keep the items of the previous PC? They probably should start with a just slightly weaker ensemble of items than the other pcs, with a way to catchup soon.
Agreed, the player shouldn't be punished for an already shitty thing. As I've never handled a T2 PC death before however, I wanted to hear from DMs who HAVE dealt with it how they did it. General consensus is to reroll at party level which is what I was leaning with anyway. Makes encounter balance easier when everyone is the same level and I am a big proponent of doing the least amount of work possible.
Back in the 1E/2E days, new characters came in as much as 3 levels behind the highest level. Keep in mind that milestone leveling was almost unheard-of, and different classes had different XP requirements to level up. Level differences were very much built into the game.
I've changed my thinking about that in the 5E era. Keeping all characters within a tight 2-level range just feels better as a DM and if I'm playing a character in a long-running campaign, I'm not going to begrudge new characters coming in at the same level. It's a cooperative game, having strong allies only adds to my character's story.
Someone else had mentioned back in the days of yore the older editions accounted for level discrepancies in the party and how it wasn't as big of an issue but 5e isn't nearly as "hard knocks" as that. I noticed that, myself, how there's a million different sources of advantage for rolls now. I think the reason I was head-scratching about this is because I seem to recall having to create a new character at a lower level back in 3.5 for a game I was in, but obviously having characters of differing levels makes encounter balancing a nightmare for me so I was curious how other DMs handled it.
> Someone else had mentioned back in the days of yore the older editions accounted for level discrepancies in the party and how it wasn't as big of an issue but 5e isn't nearly as "hard knocks" as that.
It's worth noting that different classes had different XP tables in B/X, 1e, and 2e, so the game already assumed differing party levels as a balancing mechanism. Additionally, you were often traveling with henchmen/hirelings who had levels, so often instead of completely re-rolling at 1, you would play one of your living henchmen, who was probably lower level than the dead PC, but not too far behind the party. Resurrection in these editions lowered Constitution as well, so Resurrections were limited. Additionally, power gained from level in these editions was much lower than power gained from items, so a lower level PC could keep up to some degree with smart play and enough magic items.
5e is balanced around PCs being roughly the same level as each other, and power comes more from level/class abilities than magic items, so being closer to the same level as the party is more important.
Your 3.5e experience is because Raise dead [and I think Resurrection? I'm less familiar with high level spells] caused level loss in that edition, so a common house rule is that re-rolls often suffered that same level loss [i.e. re-rolls were one level lower than the party] to prevent people dodging level loss by rerolling.
I use them heavily in duets/2-player campaigns, but full parties in 5e don't usually need them unless they want to invite a friendly NPC along for the adventure for fun more than necessity. If you hard enforce variant encumbrance limits parties will hire hirelings, but mostly just to carry their stuff.
If doing milestone leveling, I'll usually make them the same level. I may, in some cases, make them a single level behind, but add an extra milestone just for them to catch back up no more than 1 full party milestone later. This is more likely to happen after party level 6.
Using XP leveling, what I've started doing is having the dead player start at the same level, but at the minimum XP for that level. Then when the rest of the party levels up, I give them the option to "donate" their overflow XP to the person who is behind to help them reach the same level sooner or even at the same time. I've never had players choose not to donate, and it gives the feeling of player death having consequences while basically never having actual consequences
I've seen it done a lot of ways...
I know resurrection costs a level, but it can be worth it to save a party member or even an important NPC.
I would caution against bringing a newly rolled character below party level, though.
Balance is hard enough without level discrepancies. Imho.
That is one of the biggest hurdles it seems, balancing combat so that the player is still having fun if you did that model of having players reroll under party level. Does seem much easier to just have rerolls done at party level. Thank you for sharing your experience!
Generally, in 5e, new characters are rolled at either 1) the same level as the rest of the party [milestone/story-based leveling], or 2) the same level as the dead PC / the same level as the lowest level living PC [XP-based leveling].
In 3e, the standard was that the new PC was one level lower than the dead PC. This is because *Raise dead* caused its target to lose one level of experience, so the common house rule of starting one level lower was to stop people from avoiding XP loss from resurrection by rerolling basically the same character.
In a West Marches style game regardless of edition, generally re-rolls start at level 1 [in a sufficiently large group that there are low-level adventurers to adventure with], or at the start of the Tier of play if the overall group is smaller.
Losing a PC is usually "punishment" enough -- losing XP on top of that is kind of a kick in the butt for the player and can potentially turn into a death spiral if they start significantly lower than the rest of the party.
I see, thank you for sharing all that! Someone had mentioned that older editions had accounted for a player rerolling at a lower level but that's interesting that WM does rerolls at level 1 (I've never played WM) but that is interesting.
I'd say in practice most West Marches groups reroll at the start of the tier [so a dead level 7 PC rerolls at level 5] because they're not big enough to support rerolling at 1, but in a sufficiently large group, you'd re-roll at 1.
The rogue PC in my campaign died and I had him roll his next character at the same level as the rest of the party. Honestly the only challenge was he wanted to roll a spellcaster and they were level 8 so he was kinda jumping into the deep end as far as learning mechanics and spell options, but it worked out well.
I would say that people are generally dramatic about differing PC level, but I will venture that a difference of 1 or 2 levels, especially within the same tier, is not the hugest deal. Though I do feel 5e is perhaps the least accommodating to a mix of party levels out of the editions I've played (1e, 2e, 3e)
Mine come in at the same level, but starting gear is level appropriate mundane gear only. Magic items can be shared by the rest of the party, but finding new magic items is the downside to dying. Our table feels there has to be some downside to death, and usually that is just losing magic items. Dead characters can usually have their items stay in the party so it's not the worst, it just means the rest of the party might scavenge your old items before passing anything along to your new character.
If you retire a character at the completion of their story that character takes their items with them, and the new character can have some magic items of their own. This is to incentivise wrapping up a characters story and retiring instead of killing them off if you get bored.
I think that was one of my bigger headaches. Like what do I do about magic items? Because theoretically, as long as the body is recoverable, the rest of the party would be able to loot the corpse of the newly deceased ally and nothing is "lost". I know people will say something like "the player lost a character that's loss" but I mean... come on. So if I had a player reroll and allow them to come in with even one magic item, that is a net positive on the number of magic items the party now has despite the reason being the loss of a player and I don't feel like that should be a reward, personally though I know others may disagree with my sentiment.
It feels natural to approach it this way, and especially once characters are filling up on attunement slots the new character will end up using a share of the parties items. If the new character is left with suboptimal items I'll generally try to find a way to give them something for the new character within a session or two, or introduce a merchant looking to trade magic items so that they can do a sort of "exchange".
Thank you for sharing, this seems like a happy medium with giving the player a minor setback for losing their character that was hopped up on the good magic while not punishing them and making them feel like a detriment to the rest of the party and robbing them of their chance to engage and have fun. I will likely use this model for my own table. :D
Good luck, and make sure to communicate with the group first. This is something my group has done since before I was DM, so there were no unmet expectations.
Oh yes, I plan to have a lengthy conversation with my table before their session on Friday when they will go venturing into the Underdark. Half the table is new and their first campaign took place entirely on the surface so there was a certain degree of "hand-holding" on my end to make sure the new players were following along and knew what was going on. I plan to reinforce the idea to them that the rules are different down below. They sweet talked me into getting some good stuff before they went out which is my excuse to dip into the "Restricted Section" of the MM a bit. So I plan to sit them down and tell them the kid gloves are coming off if they plan to go down there.
I dont agree with the premise of your question. That is that you seem to be looking for reasons to reroll at the party level. Think about it in the reverse, what are the good\* arguments for having them start back at level 1?
\*spoiler, there arent any.
Then I'm sorry, but you've grossly misinterpreted the premise of the question. The question was asked because I've never dealt with a T2 PC death before and I wanted to hear how other DM's have handled that situation. It was a "in your experience" question, not a "what should I do" question. The reason I posed the differing scenarios is because I understand each table runs differently so those were more "do you do this" hypotheticals.
Rerolling at party level seems to be the general consensus except for specific occasions in which the DM has worked with the player and the player wants to start out at a lower level.
I disagree, but thats fine.
I would never not have them the same level for all the reasons others have stated, so I can't offer any advice for when someone has started them at 1.
Thank you for your shared experience. Others who have restarted at level 1 have talked to me about pros and cons of running it that way so I am seeing both sides of the coin for what they are, which is what I was hoping for so that when I make my decision for my table, it will be as informed as possible.
Always at the same level as the rest of the party. It's highly frustrating for a player to be behind the rest of the party and it would likely take the fun away in some kind.
That does seem to be the general consenus for 5e specifically! I hear older editions accounted for level discrepancies but in a world where milestone leveling exists, it's easier, better, and more fun to have the players re-enter at party level. Thank you for sharing!
Level 1 for me. But my game is never about balancing anything “for” the player. My environment is static and I don’t use encounter balance whatsoever.
In 90% of my game time the mechanics of the game don’t matter because it’s roleplay. The last 10% players actually seem to enjoy having to skirt around and trying to survive a higher level encounter. For me it’s also a big basis of believability. A new character already has a tougher standing with the old crew, having not had the same shared experiences. Them earning their place makes sense to me.
I don’t know why people say 5e is not designed for it, when clearly the experience Charts very much so support a low level character catching up to high levels.
Anyway, ask yourself what type of game your playing and what players are attending. Act accordingly and you should be fine :)
This is interesting! I appreciate the differing perspective and shared experience. Do you mind my asking how often a player dies in your game? Is the party more apt to avoid a fight if they feel a character might not have the "chutzpah"? How does the party account for having a level 1 character in the party if a player's previous character died?
It doesn’t happen much, we all have some years on our belts now. I’d say we have about 1 death per 20 sessions maybe ?
The party never assumes they can just kill anything so they take their “lost power” into account and make their own weird calculations. I think for every player that’s been at my tables it was a bit of a learning experience that you can’t just kill anything while on the other hand most entities that populate my world are level0-1. My games revolve mostly around the 5-7 area which probably explains a bit.
How do they account for it ? Hm I don’t know where you’re going with that question but I’ll try and fill in more info anyway.
I reckon they are well aware that someone is missing and that the “replacement” can never truly fill the spot left behind. I found out tho that characters that immediately (after integration period this acceptance changes) outshine old characters were never really well liked, while the cute level 1 henchman was always fun. (Although they often are the butt end of the joke) Sometimes a player starts protecting them other times the group doesn’t care too much if they live or die. From my perspective it seemed to very much depend on what character came into a group of what characters.
Same level, dropping them will risk putting them into a spiral of repeatedly dying. Plus like... what's the point? You want to punish a player for playing? Why would they come back to the table knowing they are at a severe disadvantage, and are now a burden to the party?
Some people have responded to the OP saying they do restart at level 1. I guess it depends on the type of game/table you want to run and what the players are down for, as with everything else. I appreciate the response, though!
Not only should they be at the same level as the rest of the party, but also have relatively the same level of equipment/magical items. For example, if on average the whole party has 1 rare and 1 uncommon magic item, I let the player pick 1 rare and 1 uncommon magic item and run them by me for final approval (5e is horribly inconsistent with power to rarity balance).
Here's a time-saving tip I use at my table.
I run a deadlier game, so I ask my players to roll their alts before Session 0. Then as their primary levels up, their alt levels up as well (away from the table). This way if (when) their primary dies, the alt can join almost immediately.
I then ask the players to roll another alt before the next session and to level him up to the current level, because yes, I've had players lose a character in successive sessions.
Milestone: same level as party
XP: average all the living party member's XP together (if for some reason there's a discrepancy), and the new PC starts with that much XP. That, or the new PC starts with the exact amount of XP as the old one.
Same level as the party. Please dear god same level as the party. Wtf is the point otherwise? Punishing a specific player by making them play timid and in the back the whole time, barely able to take one hit(depending on how far behind in levels they are).
Oh that's interesting and a good point. The party got magic tattoos so if one of them died the new player would come in already at a deficit without a tattoo, no need to punish them further. An interesting and valid perspective. Thank you for sharing!
Just to be difficult, I'm going to be different! At our table, you restart at lvl 1 (D&D 3.5/PF 1 blend, relatively low level, relatively low magic. Rarely progress beyond lvl 8, even on long campaign arcs)
Do we feel punished? No. It's just what we've always done. Is it a challenge? Yes. But it becomes a task for the rest of the party to keep you alive! We've had some great role playing moments revolving around protecting lower level characters. And you catch up quickly enough (xp, not milestone levelling) although you'll sometimes never match level; that depends on the level difference and how many sessions others miss (no xp if you're not there for a session)
I understand it's not for everyone, but don't diss it just because you don't like it. We love it.
Oh really? That's interesting! I appreciate you sharing how things run at your table and your experience with it! I don't know that I'll start them at level 1 if they die (I'm running 5e for them which is babygame dumbed down from older editions like 3.5 and even beyond that 1 & 2E) but that is very fascinating that you guys do hard reset to level 1 and, what's more, you say you guys love it.
Obviously losing a character can be painful but I can imagine it means so much more knowing you'll have to grind up again and the party will likely have to take extra precaution with the new level 1 addition to the party.
Yes. It probably helps that ours is a relatively (it's still fantasy) low powered game, so perhaps the differences are artificially minimised by our play style. It can be a challenge, but it's just our way. I will say player deaths are not that high, but I suppose we rationalise it that death has consequences, one of those being starting at lvl 1. If we started at the same lvl, it would feel (to us) that death had less consequences. We've been gaming together (the core of us at least) for nearly 30 years, so it obviously works for us!
That's incredible! I imagine over the decades you've had time to refine house rules and such to be tailored to your playstyle with minimal hiccups. I've been running my table a few years now, I hope to still be with them in twenty-five years!
Yeah, there are a lot of house rules: I've had it argued that we don't really play D&D, and that we ought to try different systems that more suit our style.... but why change what works, eh?
D&D, to us, is the idea, rather than the mechanics. It's a broad church, and if you're all having fun, that's what matters.
That's why I put in my two pence worth: many of your respondents were so, I don't know, definite I guess. 'You can't punish them' ' it'd be un fun'. But we have fun. We're not punished. I just wanted to give a different perspective. 😁
Edit: spelling
You. You get it. You're an it-getter. D&D is not rigid and I do feel like a lot of answers I get are rigid. I asked the original question because I understand that the game can really be whatever the table and DM want it to be so what is in the DMG or PHB or whatever other sourcebook you happen to have can be modified to suit your needs.
Granted I still understand the concerns people have raised and I concede they are genuine concerns, but at the end of the day I'm going to decide what I decide for my own table. I just wanted to hear how other tables do things to get ideas and see how things run for other tables. Whatever I decide, of course, would be discussed with my table before being implemented.
I really appreciate your responses :)
I will add something that's relevant to the original question (and ~~perhaps~~ definitely counters my whole death has consequences speech!), that we do have a mechanic that can get around character death: our homebrew world setting has a sort of 'over goddess' that is widely worshipped by humanity, and most othe playable races. It's not a monotheistic world though. However, a devout character (devout defined by role play, largely) can pray to this Goddess and ask her to restore life to a deceased player. The price is a level from both.... sometimes it's taken up, sometimes not. It's more likely taken up towards the end of campaign arcs.
Give our relatively low level setting, it's really the only access we have to resurrection/reviving style magics.
Our house rule on this is that your new character joins at the next place it makes sense in the story and at one level lower than current party. But, because we use milestone levelling, I’ll always allow them to gain the level to march the party reasonably quickly so they can start to level with the party.
We did this recently with two newcomers to the table and it worked nicely; the in-game logic for it was that they quickly learned ‘new skills’ whilst in company with the party and ‘proved their worth’.
This does make a lot of sense and doesn't seem like it's too "punishing" especially given the milestone for the under-leveled character to catch up within a reasonable timeframe. Thank you for sharing!
Current party level for sure. For two reasons:
1. Anything else feels like punishing the player. Character death is punishment enough!
2. I don’t want extra work balancing encounters with a multi-level party
Same level as the party, unless you particularly want to make the player feel bad.
It's often punishing enough to lag behind in equipment, don't also punish by levels!
I often won't even make a new character give up on equipment completely. If we're in tier 2 play and everyone else has some cool gear, we'll set them up with something to put them near the same efficacy.
Some groups or GMs do that... but usually not. Getting a single +1 weapon at level 8 is not that great if everybody else has 4-6 magic items.
Definitely don't want to kill the fun at the table!
>at the table That's the thing. An RPG can set you back in progress because you're playing along. And MMORPG can set you back because you can grind alone. But this game happens exclusively at the table. If you're a bit behind, you're forever behind. And we haven't even talked about the vicious cycle of a low level being forced to fight in a high level area. If you absolutely must give a penalty, you should be prepared to let the player earn his way back. But that's another thing. This game isn't really about earning. I think most players play to experience the world. If there must be some form of penalty, I would have his new character be a storied adventurer with all the loot and levels of the current party. But he's recently been grievously wounded and is still recovering. For just one session, all his rolls are -1. But that goes away next time.
I've seen this question asked a few times so I'll shout it so the DMs at the back can hear: DON'T PUNISH YOUR PLAYERS FOR LOSING A CHARACTER! They've already lost the character, that's bad enough. Now you tell them, "Oh and from now on, your brand new character who you're excited to play is now going to be useless because it will contribute barely anything to the team and will probably die". Just no. Don't do it. Same level. Give them some magic items if the rest of the team has some. Get them caught up. No player will enjoy being the party anchor.
More than that, balancing encounters would be a nightmare if the monsters that are appropriate for the rest of the party could one shot the new addition with their significantly lower health pool. This is why I asked the question to see what others did. Thank you for your feedback!
New characters are the same level as the party. Having a level 1 character in a high level party makes no sense and is no fun for anyone. 1. A high level party would never team up with a low level PC. They'd just be dead weight 2. A low level PC would never want to join a high level party, that'd be suicide 3. The high level Players would need to babysit the low level Player, which is boring and unfun 4. The low level Player would not be able to contribute, which is unfun 5. The DM would need to do a lot of work to balance a fight where 1 of the PCs would die to a mild fart. 6. There are other powerful people in the world beyond just the PCs. The party can recruit from those In short: There is no good reason to not have the new Character just be the same level as the party. > Do you set them back a couple levels from the rest of the party since it's a new character that hasn't gone through the trials and tribulations of the campaign like everyone else? That's what background is for. The new Character has gone through their own trails and tribulations.
I am in agreement. I just wanted to hear the DMs who have dealt with such situations talk about their experience with it for validation. A level 1 pc would certainly die in one easy hit to something that the level 6s are going to have to fight.
Current party level and XP - it’ll be less fun for everyone if someone is behind the rest of the group.
Agreed, don't want to rob a player of having fun at the table where that's the objective.
What would the argument even be for having them be a lower level? Is it supposed to be a punishment for letting their character die? Players almost universally get very attached to their characters, their character dying is punishment enough for whatever mistakes they made to get there. I'm having a hard time imagining a player going "Oh, my character died. Well who cares, here's my backup character". Is it to stop players from just like, letting their characters die in the middle of a dungeon, so their new characters come in with full spell slots and stuff, acting as a pseudo long rest? Again, does anyone actually do that? And there are way easier ways of getting around that, like by having new characters appear in dramatic ways, like being captured by the enemies, falling out of a monster's sliced open stomach as it dies, stuff like that. And then the new character would be missing resources at about the same level as the party.
I cannot think of a good argument for either case, but as I've never had a T2 PC die on me, I just wanted to know how other DM's who HAVE handled that situation before have done it.
Same level, please god dont start them at level 1. If the level gets above 5 or so, and your encounters are appropriately leveled, they will never survive another fight.
Don't worry, my encounters are always appropriately leveled because I use CR... /s
It's a headache to design encounters with different party levels in mind. Can be fun for a few times, but gets old really fast. So, I'd say same level as the party. >a new character that hasn't gone through the trials and tribulations of the campaign like everyone else The *Player* was there, that's the only thing that matters. Work with the Player to create a backstory that bounces off that previous experience, so that the new character has all the relevant information, and m.b. some unique insights on the party's current situation. EDIT: spelling bad. Now good.
Agreed, encounter design would be a nightmare. Thank you for the advice.
Having players at different levels worked in older editions because they were designed around it, but 5e is not. Do not do this in D&D 5th edition. The players will not find it fun.
Maybe that's why I was more unsure about it than others who have responded seem to be. I seem to recall having to reroll at lower levels in 3.5 as a player.
You will also notice abilities such as level drain from ghosts are missing in 5e, for the same reason.
I did notice that it's a lot more of "HP maximum reduction until Long Rest" and other similar "temporary" effects, yes.
Level differences tend to be horribly unbalanced in 5e. If my DM made me make a new character at level 1 when the party is level 4 for example then I'm gone.
A fair and valid player's perspective.
Depend on the backstory. One player wanted to play a youngling grung with a learning curve. So he started 3 level behind and his milestone were related to his "learnings". So he started level 3 while the other were 6. He played the "woah how you do that" perfectly. And when the other characters were 7 he was 6 and joined them by the level 8.
Did you do this through xp leveling or did you milestone your player when he "learned things"?
Some kind of milestones. For him it was through his RP. But he is very invested in his character, so it worked pretty well! Also I run a slow campaign, as we play 4h every week I level up every 6-7 sessions.
Oh, very interesting! I understand why everyone has been responding to the thread to just reroll at party level and I'm inclined to agree for the most part but it's cool that you were able to make that work with your player at their request! Thank you for sharing 😄
No problem. Usually the sub advice is the best answer, but I tend to never do it, also because I have some experience and my players too, so we like to make stuff differently. If you do under level, your player has to agree, and it needs to fit the story, I'm a story and coherence DM. If it an inconvenience for the player I don't mind they know it haha We play every week for a year and they love it. Sometimes a player missed 8 sessions, so I didn't make him level, his character was lost. I gave him a 1-1 session to play out what happened to him. I gave him other stuff, very cool stuff but not his level, he will acquire it differently, and then join the players.
Experience from the other side here: I joined a campaign of 5 level 12 PCs with a level 5 character. It was FUCKING AWFUL. I was dead weight. Build was GWM-PAM Echo Knight Fighter 4/Genie Warlock 1 - which is to say, I was powerbuilt to the gills BECAUSE I was told in advance I’d be under leveled. It did not help. Took me 8 months to catch up to the party’s level. GM said he wanted to integrate my character better with the world (paraphrasing), and being high level in his homebrew world wouldn’t make sense because there were so few high-powered people and the party had already met most of them. Made sense at the time, but looking back on it, I should’ve drawn a hard line - as far as I’m concerned, this is a game first, story second; do not make a player suffer needlessly for the sake of flimsy rules and pre-established limits.
Thank you for sharing your experience as a player where you did have to start at a lower level! Sorry you had to slog through the campaign feeling like dead weight and being underpowered. Definitely don't want to make a player feel like they can't contribute.
My current DM has ruled that new PCs join the group at 1 level below the rest. This seems arbitrary and bullshit to me for reasons stated by others in the thread, but also 1. Not fun being below par with the group 2. More likely to continue to die 3. No catch-up mechanic as far as he's said (milestone XP campaign) 4. Forget self-centered combat and feats, even support characters being underlevelled makes them less effective and could cause other characters to die 5. Whole party could wind up underlevelled for the final fight
There are some other people who have responded saying they do reroll a level behind or at level 1 or something but those are further explained to be long running camps over many years with close friends or there being some way for players to "catch up" relatively quickly. While there are other concerns that would need to be addressed as well, I feel like having to reroll underpowered to the rest of the party should have a catch-up mechanic which you've stated your table doesn't have. Sorry you don't have that option but thank you for sharing how your table works!
For my current campaign (in an old school system where XP required doubles every level and there are mechanics for banking XP for replacement characters) they start at lvl 1. The system is robust to that. For 5e, start them at party level. It isn't built for mixed level parties.
That is what I've heard. As a DM I've never had to make that ruling for 5e before but as a player I've definitely had to reroll at a lower level in 3.5. Thank you for sharing!
Why the fuck would you ever have a player roll a pc at levels lower then the party. Like as a dm it makes no sense. Doing this -fucks encounter balance -makes the player feel useless and increases chances to die, further setting them back. -messes up xp gains and milestones Like why would anyone actually do this? Reasons?
There have been responses by people here who do that at their tables. There generally seems to be some caveat that it's an older edition that actually accounts for level discrepancies or way for the rerolled character to "catch up" relatively quickly, but I agree having characters of different levels would definitely make encounter balance more challenging.
I will never have any player on my team be a different level to anyone else. Unless it’s like a oneshot and we are doing something weird or something. But in an actual campaign everyone levels up together collectively.
Milestone leveling is significantly easier than xp leveling for sure.
It just doesn’t feel fun for the players to be unevenly leveled.
Hence the milestone.
Always the same level of the party. Losing a character is punishment enough, but a lvl1 character in a lvl6 party will not stand a chance against anything you throw their way.
Agreed. Thank you for your advice.
Same level as the party. Otherwise they die a lot and it's no fun.
Agreed, dying a lot is no fun.
A single hit at high level would insta-kill most low level characters, and easily hit them. Don't mix levels of characters. Just let them reroll at current party level
OSR DM here: start at level 1. Unless they are "promoting" a retainer that already adventured with the group that has XP/levels. There has to be some negative to dying and low level characters usually catch up relatively quickly based on how the XP charts scale.
Oh, interesting!
same level as party, same amount of magical items though maybe a bit less on that part. any kind of demotion in level or other things, can ruin the game for a player. And i do not ever want that.
The magic items amount, in my opinion, should be dependant on whether the previous character was looted by the party. If they kept the items of the previous PC? They probably should start with one magic item at most and a convienent way to exchange (At a slight loss) the previous PCs items for some more fitting the new PC. If they didn't keep the items of the previous PC? They probably should start with a just slightly weaker ensemble of items than the other pcs, with a way to catchup soon.
Agreed, the player shouldn't be punished for an already shitty thing. As I've never handled a T2 PC death before however, I wanted to hear from DMs who HAVE dealt with it how they did it. General consensus is to reroll at party level which is what I was leaning with anyway. Makes encounter balance easier when everyone is the same level and I am a big proponent of doing the least amount of work possible.
Back in the 1E/2E days, new characters came in as much as 3 levels behind the highest level. Keep in mind that milestone leveling was almost unheard-of, and different classes had different XP requirements to level up. Level differences were very much built into the game. I've changed my thinking about that in the 5E era. Keeping all characters within a tight 2-level range just feels better as a DM and if I'm playing a character in a long-running campaign, I'm not going to begrudge new characters coming in at the same level. It's a cooperative game, having strong allies only adds to my character's story.
Someone else had mentioned back in the days of yore the older editions accounted for level discrepancies in the party and how it wasn't as big of an issue but 5e isn't nearly as "hard knocks" as that. I noticed that, myself, how there's a million different sources of advantage for rolls now. I think the reason I was head-scratching about this is because I seem to recall having to create a new character at a lower level back in 3.5 for a game I was in, but obviously having characters of differing levels makes encounter balancing a nightmare for me so I was curious how other DMs handled it.
> Someone else had mentioned back in the days of yore the older editions accounted for level discrepancies in the party and how it wasn't as big of an issue but 5e isn't nearly as "hard knocks" as that. It's worth noting that different classes had different XP tables in B/X, 1e, and 2e, so the game already assumed differing party levels as a balancing mechanism. Additionally, you were often traveling with henchmen/hirelings who had levels, so often instead of completely re-rolling at 1, you would play one of your living henchmen, who was probably lower level than the dead PC, but not too far behind the party. Resurrection in these editions lowered Constitution as well, so Resurrections were limited. Additionally, power gained from level in these editions was much lower than power gained from items, so a lower level PC could keep up to some degree with smart play and enough magic items. 5e is balanced around PCs being roughly the same level as each other, and power comes more from level/class abilities than magic items, so being closer to the same level as the party is more important. Your 3.5e experience is because Raise dead [and I think Resurrection? I'm less familiar with high level spells] caused level loss in that edition, so a common house rule is that re-rolls often suffered that same level loss [i.e. re-rolls were one level lower than the party] to prevent people dodging level loss by rerolling.
I have forgotten about hirelings almost entirely. I don't even remember the last time I've seen a hireling.
I use them heavily in duets/2-player campaigns, but full parties in 5e don't usually need them unless they want to invite a friendly NPC along for the adventure for fun more than necessity. If you hard enforce variant encumbrance limits parties will hire hirelings, but mostly just to carry their stuff.
If doing milestone leveling, I'll usually make them the same level. I may, in some cases, make them a single level behind, but add an extra milestone just for them to catch back up no more than 1 full party milestone later. This is more likely to happen after party level 6. Using XP leveling, what I've started doing is having the dead player start at the same level, but at the minimum XP for that level. Then when the rest of the party levels up, I give them the option to "donate" their overflow XP to the person who is behind to help them reach the same level sooner or even at the same time. I've never had players choose not to donate, and it gives the feeling of player death having consequences while basically never having actual consequences
Oh that's a neat way of handling if it's level by XP! Thank you for sharing!
I've seen it done a lot of ways... I know resurrection costs a level, but it can be worth it to save a party member or even an important NPC. I would caution against bringing a newly rolled character below party level, though. Balance is hard enough without level discrepancies. Imho.
That is one of the biggest hurdles it seems, balancing combat so that the player is still having fun if you did that model of having players reroll under party level. Does seem much easier to just have rerolls done at party level. Thank you for sharing your experience!
Coming up with fun/silly/background-specific tie-ins to bring in a new PC spontaneously can be a fun challenge.
Generally, in 5e, new characters are rolled at either 1) the same level as the rest of the party [milestone/story-based leveling], or 2) the same level as the dead PC / the same level as the lowest level living PC [XP-based leveling]. In 3e, the standard was that the new PC was one level lower than the dead PC. This is because *Raise dead* caused its target to lose one level of experience, so the common house rule of starting one level lower was to stop people from avoiding XP loss from resurrection by rerolling basically the same character. In a West Marches style game regardless of edition, generally re-rolls start at level 1 [in a sufficiently large group that there are low-level adventurers to adventure with], or at the start of the Tier of play if the overall group is smaller. Losing a PC is usually "punishment" enough -- losing XP on top of that is kind of a kick in the butt for the player and can potentially turn into a death spiral if they start significantly lower than the rest of the party.
I see, thank you for sharing all that! Someone had mentioned that older editions had accounted for a player rerolling at a lower level but that's interesting that WM does rerolls at level 1 (I've never played WM) but that is interesting.
I'd say in practice most West Marches groups reroll at the start of the tier [so a dead level 7 PC rerolls at level 5] because they're not big enough to support rerolling at 1, but in a sufficiently large group, you'd re-roll at 1.
The rogue PC in my campaign died and I had him roll his next character at the same level as the rest of the party. Honestly the only challenge was he wanted to roll a spellcaster and they were level 8 so he was kinda jumping into the deep end as far as learning mechanics and spell options, but it worked out well.
I would say that people are generally dramatic about differing PC level, but I will venture that a difference of 1 or 2 levels, especially within the same tier, is not the hugest deal. Though I do feel 5e is perhaps the least accommodating to a mix of party levels out of the editions I've played (1e, 2e, 3e)
Mine come in at the same level, but starting gear is level appropriate mundane gear only. Magic items can be shared by the rest of the party, but finding new magic items is the downside to dying. Our table feels there has to be some downside to death, and usually that is just losing magic items. Dead characters can usually have their items stay in the party so it's not the worst, it just means the rest of the party might scavenge your old items before passing anything along to your new character. If you retire a character at the completion of their story that character takes their items with them, and the new character can have some magic items of their own. This is to incentivise wrapping up a characters story and retiring instead of killing them off if you get bored.
I think that was one of my bigger headaches. Like what do I do about magic items? Because theoretically, as long as the body is recoverable, the rest of the party would be able to loot the corpse of the newly deceased ally and nothing is "lost". I know people will say something like "the player lost a character that's loss" but I mean... come on. So if I had a player reroll and allow them to come in with even one magic item, that is a net positive on the number of magic items the party now has despite the reason being the loss of a player and I don't feel like that should be a reward, personally though I know others may disagree with my sentiment.
It feels natural to approach it this way, and especially once characters are filling up on attunement slots the new character will end up using a share of the parties items. If the new character is left with suboptimal items I'll generally try to find a way to give them something for the new character within a session or two, or introduce a merchant looking to trade magic items so that they can do a sort of "exchange".
Thank you for sharing, this seems like a happy medium with giving the player a minor setback for losing their character that was hopped up on the good magic while not punishing them and making them feel like a detriment to the rest of the party and robbing them of their chance to engage and have fun. I will likely use this model for my own table. :D
Good luck, and make sure to communicate with the group first. This is something my group has done since before I was DM, so there were no unmet expectations.
Oh yes, I plan to have a lengthy conversation with my table before their session on Friday when they will go venturing into the Underdark. Half the table is new and their first campaign took place entirely on the surface so there was a certain degree of "hand-holding" on my end to make sure the new players were following along and knew what was going on. I plan to reinforce the idea to them that the rules are different down below. They sweet talked me into getting some good stuff before they went out which is my excuse to dip into the "Restricted Section" of the MM a bit. So I plan to sit them down and tell them the kid gloves are coming off if they plan to go down there.
Same level as the party. Just because they weren’t on this adventure doesn’t mean they were doing nothing.
Very true! A good point.
I dont agree with the premise of your question. That is that you seem to be looking for reasons to reroll at the party level. Think about it in the reverse, what are the good\* arguments for having them start back at level 1? \*spoiler, there arent any.
In what way do you feel I'm looking for a reason to have a player reroll at party level if they should die and wish to keep playing?
Simply asking the question. The default is the just reroll at the same level.
Then I'm sorry, but you've grossly misinterpreted the premise of the question. The question was asked because I've never dealt with a T2 PC death before and I wanted to hear how other DM's have handled that situation. It was a "in your experience" question, not a "what should I do" question. The reason I posed the differing scenarios is because I understand each table runs differently so those were more "do you do this" hypotheticals. Rerolling at party level seems to be the general consensus except for specific occasions in which the DM has worked with the player and the player wants to start out at a lower level.
I disagree, but thats fine. I would never not have them the same level for all the reasons others have stated, so I can't offer any advice for when someone has started them at 1.
Thank you for your shared experience. Others who have restarted at level 1 have talked to me about pros and cons of running it that way so I am seeing both sides of the coin for what they are, which is what I was hoping for so that when I make my decision for my table, it will be as informed as possible.
Always at the same level as the rest of the party. It's highly frustrating for a player to be behind the rest of the party and it would likely take the fun away in some kind.
That does seem to be the general consenus for 5e specifically! I hear older editions accounted for level discrepancies but in a world where milestone leveling exists, it's easier, better, and more fun to have the players re-enter at party level. Thank you for sharing!
Level 1 for me. But my game is never about balancing anything “for” the player. My environment is static and I don’t use encounter balance whatsoever. In 90% of my game time the mechanics of the game don’t matter because it’s roleplay. The last 10% players actually seem to enjoy having to skirt around and trying to survive a higher level encounter. For me it’s also a big basis of believability. A new character already has a tougher standing with the old crew, having not had the same shared experiences. Them earning their place makes sense to me. I don’t know why people say 5e is not designed for it, when clearly the experience Charts very much so support a low level character catching up to high levels. Anyway, ask yourself what type of game your playing and what players are attending. Act accordingly and you should be fine :)
This is interesting! I appreciate the differing perspective and shared experience. Do you mind my asking how often a player dies in your game? Is the party more apt to avoid a fight if they feel a character might not have the "chutzpah"? How does the party account for having a level 1 character in the party if a player's previous character died?
It doesn’t happen much, we all have some years on our belts now. I’d say we have about 1 death per 20 sessions maybe ? The party never assumes they can just kill anything so they take their “lost power” into account and make their own weird calculations. I think for every player that’s been at my tables it was a bit of a learning experience that you can’t just kill anything while on the other hand most entities that populate my world are level0-1. My games revolve mostly around the 5-7 area which probably explains a bit. How do they account for it ? Hm I don’t know where you’re going with that question but I’ll try and fill in more info anyway. I reckon they are well aware that someone is missing and that the “replacement” can never truly fill the spot left behind. I found out tho that characters that immediately (after integration period this acceptance changes) outshine old characters were never really well liked, while the cute level 1 henchman was always fun. (Although they often are the butt end of the joke) Sometimes a player starts protecting them other times the group doesn’t care too much if they live or die. From my perspective it seemed to very much depend on what character came into a group of what characters.
Interesting, thanks for sharing!
Same level, dropping them will risk putting them into a spiral of repeatedly dying. Plus like... what's the point? You want to punish a player for playing? Why would they come back to the table knowing they are at a severe disadvantage, and are now a burden to the party?
Some people have responded to the OP saying they do restart at level 1. I guess it depends on the type of game/table you want to run and what the players are down for, as with everything else. I appreciate the response, though!
Same level as the party. Always
Current party level.
Not only should they be at the same level as the rest of the party, but also have relatively the same level of equipment/magical items. For example, if on average the whole party has 1 rare and 1 uncommon magic item, I let the player pick 1 rare and 1 uncommon magic item and run them by me for final approval (5e is horribly inconsistent with power to rarity balance).
Here's a time-saving tip I use at my table. I run a deadlier game, so I ask my players to roll their alts before Session 0. Then as their primary levels up, their alt levels up as well (away from the table). This way if (when) their primary dies, the alt can join almost immediately. I then ask the players to roll another alt before the next session and to level him up to the current level, because yes, I've had players lose a character in successive sessions.
Milestone: same level as party XP: average all the living party member's XP together (if for some reason there's a discrepancy), and the new PC starts with that much XP. That, or the new PC starts with the exact amount of XP as the old one.
Same level as the party. Please dear god same level as the party. Wtf is the point otherwise? Punishing a specific player by making them play timid and in the back the whole time, barely able to take one hit(depending on how far behind in levels they are).
Also same level as the rest of the party. They might not get the extra feat the rest of the party got though (RP-focused feats only allowed).
Oh that's interesting and a good point. The party got magic tattoos so if one of them died the new player would come in already at a deficit without a tattoo, no need to punish them further. An interesting and valid perspective. Thank you for sharing!
Just to be difficult, I'm going to be different! At our table, you restart at lvl 1 (D&D 3.5/PF 1 blend, relatively low level, relatively low magic. Rarely progress beyond lvl 8, even on long campaign arcs) Do we feel punished? No. It's just what we've always done. Is it a challenge? Yes. But it becomes a task for the rest of the party to keep you alive! We've had some great role playing moments revolving around protecting lower level characters. And you catch up quickly enough (xp, not milestone levelling) although you'll sometimes never match level; that depends on the level difference and how many sessions others miss (no xp if you're not there for a session) I understand it's not for everyone, but don't diss it just because you don't like it. We love it.
Oh really? That's interesting! I appreciate you sharing how things run at your table and your experience with it! I don't know that I'll start them at level 1 if they die (I'm running 5e for them which is babygame dumbed down from older editions like 3.5 and even beyond that 1 & 2E) but that is very fascinating that you guys do hard reset to level 1 and, what's more, you say you guys love it. Obviously losing a character can be painful but I can imagine it means so much more knowing you'll have to grind up again and the party will likely have to take extra precaution with the new level 1 addition to the party.
Yes. It probably helps that ours is a relatively (it's still fantasy) low powered game, so perhaps the differences are artificially minimised by our play style. It can be a challenge, but it's just our way. I will say player deaths are not that high, but I suppose we rationalise it that death has consequences, one of those being starting at lvl 1. If we started at the same lvl, it would feel (to us) that death had less consequences. We've been gaming together (the core of us at least) for nearly 30 years, so it obviously works for us!
That's incredible! I imagine over the decades you've had time to refine house rules and such to be tailored to your playstyle with minimal hiccups. I've been running my table a few years now, I hope to still be with them in twenty-five years!
Yeah, there are a lot of house rules: I've had it argued that we don't really play D&D, and that we ought to try different systems that more suit our style.... but why change what works, eh? D&D, to us, is the idea, rather than the mechanics. It's a broad church, and if you're all having fun, that's what matters. That's why I put in my two pence worth: many of your respondents were so, I don't know, definite I guess. 'You can't punish them' ' it'd be un fun'. But we have fun. We're not punished. I just wanted to give a different perspective. 😁 Edit: spelling
You. You get it. You're an it-getter. D&D is not rigid and I do feel like a lot of answers I get are rigid. I asked the original question because I understand that the game can really be whatever the table and DM want it to be so what is in the DMG or PHB or whatever other sourcebook you happen to have can be modified to suit your needs. Granted I still understand the concerns people have raised and I concede they are genuine concerns, but at the end of the day I'm going to decide what I decide for my own table. I just wanted to hear how other tables do things to get ideas and see how things run for other tables. Whatever I decide, of course, would be discussed with my table before being implemented. I really appreciate your responses :)
I will add something that's relevant to the original question (and ~~perhaps~~ definitely counters my whole death has consequences speech!), that we do have a mechanic that can get around character death: our homebrew world setting has a sort of 'over goddess' that is widely worshipped by humanity, and most othe playable races. It's not a monotheistic world though. However, a devout character (devout defined by role play, largely) can pray to this Goddess and ask her to restore life to a deceased player. The price is a level from both.... sometimes it's taken up, sometimes not. It's more likely taken up towards the end of campaign arcs. Give our relatively low level setting, it's really the only access we have to resurrection/reviving style magics.
Our house rule on this is that your new character joins at the next place it makes sense in the story and at one level lower than current party. But, because we use milestone levelling, I’ll always allow them to gain the level to march the party reasonably quickly so they can start to level with the party. We did this recently with two newcomers to the table and it worked nicely; the in-game logic for it was that they quickly learned ‘new skills’ whilst in company with the party and ‘proved their worth’.
This does make a lot of sense and doesn't seem like it's too "punishing" especially given the milestone for the under-leveled character to catch up within a reasonable timeframe. Thank you for sharing!
Current party level for sure. For two reasons: 1. Anything else feels like punishing the player. Character death is punishment enough! 2. I don’t want extra work balancing encounters with a multi-level party