Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 GaRReTT Apr 22, 2015 17:10:04	Last session , one of the group's members died during a bossfight.The rest are trying to ressurect her with but I wonder , should I give any experiance to her for the encounter or not? In my opinion I should not (I kinda like to reward based on every detail and every move the players are doing or not) but they tell me I have to give her normal experiance points after she get res......so should I or not?
#2 Rhenny Apr 22, 2015 17:20:28	DM call.    I've always been a fan of making death an experience. When it used to cost 1 con point to be raised (1e) I would balance that penalty with extra xp for dying.  In many cases the PC would meet with an intermediary of his or her God and have a chat.  Then get drawn back into the world with renewed purpose.     I think giving the PC the xp for the battle is fine.
#3 MechaPilot Apr 22, 2015 17:57:05	I don't use Xp any more, but before I stopped using it I was awarding it even to PCs who died.  However, death is nothing to be taken lightly in my game.  Being raised from the dead is difficult (casting the spell requires you to sacrifice a life to trade for the life you want to restore).  Additionally, the character who was raised will still have to deal with memories of the afterlife and memories of how she was killed.   Edit: There is something that I feel I should add.  Your thread's title asks if dead people should grow stronger, but Xp is not about "growing stronger."  Indeed, even the name "experience points" seems to indicate that the point gain is a result of having the experience.  I would consider the Xp gain a dead character receives to be a matter of learning from one's mistakes or learning more about herself (particularly if the character went to an afterlife that she wasn't expecting to go to).
#4 AaronOfBarbaria Apr 22, 2015 18:01:21	Not giving the player (because XP is for the players, not their characters) XP could come off to the group of players as a punishment for having bad luck with the dice - the player was there, at the table, participating just like everyone else... but then things went south and their character was put out of comission and they were sitting out as a player, but not only that, they also don't get the XP, and suddenly their character is weaker than the rest of the party and it feels awful (and then they die more, miss more XP, eventually have some period of time they are lower level than everyone else's character and die even more, miss even more XP... and then the player just stops showing up because there isn't any point since they can't catch up while dead and can't participate without dying).   I am, however, fully of the opinion that the game should be approached as a game - not as a simulation of these fictional characters lives - and the idea that XP/level advancement is entirely a reward for the player that is earned simply by showing up and participating should be embraced.
#5 iserith Apr 22, 2015 18:19:33	Give her double experience for participating in the defeat of the enemy, for taking a risk that led to excitement, drama, and loss, for having to sit there while other people played, for choosing to continue with her current character instead of creating a new one, and for coming back from The Other Side with dire words given to her from Death itself that her companions must heed.
#6 Barky Apr 22, 2015 19:43:17	I like the idea of standard XP for the quest, at least the part that she was in while alive. Not extra just for being dead, that feels wrong to me.   You may want to consider something special for,"crossing the veil", just to make the experience interesting. Maybe let that PC take a level of sorceror or warlock at next level-up, or replace an existing level in another class with one as sorceror or warlock. Maybe you let that player swap a feat, or grant a feat and  a curse (for balance). Or maybe there's a quest that must be run as the price for coming back. Or maybe it's just flavor stuff, like her skin will always be blue, or she now hates sunlight, or whatever.   Conceptually, I don't like the idea that you can die and come back just like before. The experience has to be both traumatizing and spiritual, there's no way you come back the same.   Just keep it balanced: they lose a level in current class and replace it with warlock. Or you gain a benefit and a penalty at same time, etc. power-wise, it's not a gain, it's just -- different.
#7 Noon Apr 22, 2015 20:34:23	If someone at the table feels they are punished, don't let that happen. Stop allowing them to play.   And really to start with, if they are telling you you have to give XP, tell them to either show that rule in the text or really spell out exactly what they mean by telling you what you have to do.
#8 MechaPilot Apr 22, 2015 20:37:59	Noon wrote:
#9 GaRReTT Apr 23, 2015 0:28:54	Strong opinions! I always try to balance the game in favor of my group without them knowing I do so.I kinda want to feel that I play along the group rather than against them but I am really strict when it comes to logical actions or rules I have set.   For those who say that she fought and died to take down a huge enemy etc etc ....It was not really that strong of a enemy for a 5 man group, the problem -which I tend to mention to them everytime - is that they do not have a proper group for the adventures they want and I want.!!!! In terms of spots in group , there is not 1 healer the group ( of 5 people ) nor is a tank. They rely solid on a paladin to be the tank, but he does not even carry a shield. The rest are very situation-depending dps such as a rogue who does damage only with sneak attacks and a sorcerer who has only 1 offensive spell( he tends to favor Roleplaying events rather that combat encounters)....So in all that I think not giving xp to the dead gives a strong message that they have to work to gain the goodies and go stronger....
#10 Noon Apr 23, 2015 0:56:05	MechaPilot wrote:
#11 Barky Apr 23, 2015 4:12:18	GaRReTT wrote:
(Reply to #11) GaRReTT	I like the idea of giving "special" loot to players that are more active in-game. I want to keep the players intrested and curious but at the same time i want them to play as a group,not as a single unit each...Being more punishable in mistakes and bad plays for me its equal to be more generous for good plays and outplays...
#13 iserith Apr 23, 2015 9:19:44	Tell the players the type of behavior you hope to see in your games, ask for their buy-in, and reward them when they do it. This might mean changing the default rewards in D&D 5e.
#14 Kayal Apr 24, 2015 9:12:27	iserith wrote:
#15 BRJN Apr 25, 2015 15:56:48	GaRReTT wrote:
#16 Krusk Apr 26, 2015 8:11:46	I'd give her XP. She survived the encounter right? I mean, she died, and was brought back and all, but her character is still around and the encounter has been defeated. Not giving XP to dead then raised PCs just means she is more likely to die in the next fight, when everyone else is a higher level than her.
#17 Archon007 Apr 26, 2015 11:29:09	GaRReTT wrote:
#18 ankiyavon Apr 26, 2015 13:52:17	I traditionally give XP to characters for any fight that they participate in.   Whether they disengage and let their allies finish it, or they die and their allies finish it, makes no difference to me; if they participated, they get their share of XP.     Whether or not I give XP for encounters that occurred entirely while they were dead depends on the system and game I'm running, largely on whether or not that game supports or expects asynchronous advancement.  5E does not expect asynchronous advancement, and so my default state for running 5E is that everyone always gets the same XP no matter what.  In other games that expect characters to be at slightly different power levels at different times, I would not give XP for encounters that occur entirely while the characters is dead.
#19 Storyteller-Zero Apr 26, 2015 18:12:46	Death IS an experience and Dying IS an experience, so why not award experience points for the encounter?   Sine this isn't a video game, it makes perfect sense to give the revived character the same EXP as the rest of the party.
#20 CFK Apr 27, 2015 23:30:52	I let players who's character died start a new character at the same level as the lowest party member, inclusing the dead character.   But whenever a character dies I ask the player what he/she would like, to play a new character or play on with the old one. It'll cost a load of gold and sometimes a magical item to bring someone back and yes, it does get exp then from the experience of dying and being brought back.
#21 Rya.Reisender Apr 28, 2015 1:05:26	XP for me is referring to the actual experience the character gained. A character does not actually gain experience from killing an enemy, but from the process that leads to killing the enemy (fighting). So if a character fights an enemy and um... gets unavailable... before that enemy is slain, he still will have the experience he got from fighting that enemy. It makes sense to still reward him XP. He will not get XP when not participating in a battle at all, however (like when he is dead and the group has to fight another enemy).   I personally don't really work much with resurrection, though. Especially in your situation where you think the group setup is bad, I'd probably just make the character die forever and try to motivate the player who lost his character to start a new one of a class the group really needs and then incorporate that into the story. Though if he really insists on keeping that character, I might also do something like a druid or cleric appearing that knows of a way to resurrect him, but they need to venture to a temple in the mountains (or a place in the forest in case of the druid) and then I make a whole chapter just involving the resurrection of that character and the player of the dead character just plays the druid / cleric temporarily.
#22 BRJN May 02, 2015 16:27:09	GaRReTT wrote: