Mutilation!

[AcadiusLost]

So, we've got this slick death system going for NWN2- it's like what we had for NWN1, but has some pretty nice improvements. We've also got it set to track, recognize and handle PC corpses that are mutilated (meaning Raise Dead will no longer work on them, though Resurrection would).

Now, with the placeable event hooks, we can script how a PC's corpse actually becomes mutilated- which leads us to a few questions which I'd appreciate opinions on, as they affect the gameplay and touch on aspects of our permadeath vision.

We could actually make corpses mutilated on receiving a certain amount of damage, from any source- we could track this using the OnDamaged event, and it would be perhaps the most "realistic" method- though it would also mean things like a fireball detonation in the area would inadvertantly mutilate any PC corpses in area.

Alternatively, we could tie it to "OnPhysicallyAttacked"- so you'd have to "bash" the PC corpse placeable in order to mutilate it. This would have the upside of allowing intentional mutilation, while removing the worry of unintentional collateral damage.

In addition to the above, the question of how much damage is needed is also raised- if we're going melee-range bash-only, we could even make it so a single "hit" would do it. (certainly the simplest option, and the one I'd be inclined to go with). However, I can also envision a party vs. party situation, in which a PC has fallen- his allies may want that fighting chance to stop their ally from being mutilated, instead of having it only take a single action on the part of the opponents.

We can expect Raise Dead spells to remain rare in NWN2-ALFA, but Resurrection spells will be yet rarer, so this does bear some consideration.

[Joos]

Awesome stuff AL. I reckon, mutilation should happen when:

1. Killed by Death effect, such as slay living, finger of death etc
2. Killed outright, ie, land on negative -10 or more in one blow (from spells, physical damage, critical hits, sneak attacks, etc)
3. Unmutilated corpse takes more than XX amount of damage (from spells, physical damage, critical hits, sneak attacks, etc)

I don't think there should be any special code to take into account specific spells or anything.

Just my opinion, obviously.

[AcadiusLost]

1. Killed by Death effect, such as slay living, finger of death etc
2. Killed outright, ie, land on negative -10 or more in one blow (from spells, physical damage, critical hits, sneak attacks, etc)
3. Unmutilated corpse takes more than XX amount of damage (from spells, physical damage, critical hits, sneak attacks, etc)

All the above are possible, and they would make for a world in which "raise dead" becomes less of an option, even when it's available. Certainly, it would lead to less PCs resurrected IC- I think this would appeal to some, less so to others.

for #1: is there any canon backing for death magic making a corpse un-raise-able? While I can see it making sense for high-level effects like Destruction or Disintegrate, I'd be hesitant to push for it on more common varieties like Phantasmal Killer, for example.

#2: Definitely do-able- but again, it changes the balance. My first ALFA PC, for example, was a mage with 4 HP, who received a 16-hp crossbow critical in about hour 3 of his ALFA-existence. At the time he was among a group full of healers, but died anyway because the damage was enough to skip bleeding and hit the morgue directly. IMHO I don't see a compelling reason for this to be a instant mutilation as well, it's already a severe case as there is no opportunity to bandage or heal. I'd be interested to hear opinions on it though, and a PnP canon perspective.

#3: Has a few technical hurdles- as soon as a PC transitions from "dying" to "dead" (at -10 HP), their body is replaced with a placeable PC corpse, which has the same name as the PC. As it's a placeable and not a creature, it no longer has an armor class, nor is it vulnerable to sneak attacks. We can track things that happen to the placeable (bash attempts, AoE spells that affect it, etc)- but it also increases the amount of data that needs to be transmitted back and forth to make sure the system is persistent across module crashes and such. To make things more complicated, the placeable essentially becomes an inventory item when a PC picks it up, and a placeable again when it's put back down- so the tracking information has to be passed back and forth to make sure the body keeps whatever damage it had accrued. At that point one also has to wonder- should a healing spell repair damage to a corpse (presuming it's less than the mutilation threshhold?)- or perhaps a mending cantrip? In short, it opens up a lot of questions.

For now, I'm inclined to implement the "on physically attacked", 1-hit (bash) mutilation option, and look at expanding the system down the line if it has broad support and/or the nod from Standards and Admin. Still interested to hear perspectives on the topic, though.

[Joos]

for #1: is there any canon backing for death magic making a corpse un-raise-able? While I can see it making sense for high-level effects like Destruction or Disintegrate, I'd be hesitant to push for it on more common varieties like Phantasmal Killer, for example.

Certainly. It's in the spell description:

Raise Dead
Conjuration (Healing)

Level: Clr 5

Components: V, S, M, DF

Casting Time: 1 minute

Range: Touch

Target: Dead creature touched

Duration: Instantaneous

Saving Throw: None; see text

Spell Resistance: Yes (harmless)
You restore life to a deceased creature. You can raise a creature that has been dead for no longer than one day per caster level. In addition, the subject’s soul must be free and willing to return. If the subject’s soul is not willing to return, the spell does not work; therefore, a subject that wants to return receives no saving throw.

Coming back from the dead is an ordeal. The subject of the spell loses one level (or 1 Hit Die) when it is raised, just as if it had lost a level or a Hit Die to an energy-draining creature. If the subject is 1st level, it loses 2 points of Constitution instead (if this would reduce its Con to 0 or less, it can’t be raised). This level/HD loss or Constitution loss cannot be repaired by any means. A character who died with spells prepared has a 50% chance of losing any given spell upon being raised, in addition to losing spells for losing a level. A spellcasting creature that doesn’t prepare spells (such as a sorcerer) has a 50% chance of losing any given unused spell slot as if it had been used to cast a spell, in addition to losing spell slots for losing a level.

A raised creature has a number of hit points equal to its current Hit Dice. Any ability scores damaged to 0 are raised to 1. Normal poison and normal disease are cured in the process of raising the subject, but magical diseases and curses are not undone. While the spell closes mortal wounds and repairs lethal damage of most kinds, the body of the creature to be raised must be whole. Otherwise, missing parts are still missing when the creature is brought back to life. None of the dead creature’s equipment or possessions are affected in any way by this spell.

A creature who has been turned into an undead creature or killed by a death effect can’t be raised by this spell. Constructs, elementals, outsiders, and undead creatures can’t be raised. The spell cannot bring back a creature that has died of old age.

Material Component: Diamonds worth a total of least 5,000 gp.

Resuraction can raise someone killed by a death effect. I am uncertain which spells are classified as death effects, but if you wish to go down that route, I am willing to find out for you and generate a list.

#2: Definitely do-able- but again, it changes the balance. My first ALFA PC, for example, was a mage with 4 HP, who received a 16-hp crossbow critical in about hour 3 of his ALFA-existence. At the time he was among a group full of healers, but died anyway because the damage was enough to skip bleeding and hit the morgue directly. IMHO I don't see a compelling reason for this to be a instant mutilation as well, it's already a severe case as there is no opportunity to bandage or heal. I'd be interested to hear opinions on it though, and a PnP canon perspective.

I think the example you describe is a fair example of a freak accident that would render your PC unraisable, ie it wouldn't happen very often. This rule can be found in the DMG. I am not sure exactly how it is frased, but I'll look it up when I get home. I am pretty sure it is very similar to how I put it there. If the community wants to incorporate it is another matter.

#3: Has a few technical hurdles- as soon as a PC transitions from "dying" to "dead" (at -10 HP), their body is replaced with a placeable PC corpse, which has the same name as the PC. As it's a placeable and not a creature, it no longer has an armor class, nor is it vulnerable to sneak attacks. We can track things that happen to the placeable (bash attempts, AoE spells that affect it, etc)- but it also increases the amount of data that needs to be transmitted back and forth to make sure the system is persistent across module crashes and such. To make things more complicated, the placeable essentially becomes an inventory item when a PC picks it up, and a placeable again when it's put back down- so the tracking information has to be passed back and forth to make sure the body keeps whatever damage it had accrued. At that point one also has to wonder- should a healing spell repair damage to a corpse (presuming it's less than the mutilation threshhold?)- or perhaps a mending cantrip? In short, it opens up a lot of questions.

For now, I'm inclined to implement the "on physically attacked", 1-hit (bash) mutilation option, and look at expanding the system down the line if it has broad support and/or the nod from Standards and Admin. Still interested to hear perspectives on the topic, though.

How about having two placeables, one that is [corpse] the other [corpse, mutilated] and have the death script choose which one to spawn by looking at the way the PC died?

Right now [NWN1] you get a dialog box when you interact with a corpse with the options to Carry or Loot the corpse. How about we keep it that way and add the option to Mutilate as the third option?

[Grand Fromage]

Can we have a threshold on the -10 thing? I don't mind the idea, but it seems to me like getting knocked down that far would happen very often. Would there be a way to put mutilation at, for example, -30 or does it stop tracking after -10?

[Joos]

Can we have a threshold on the -10 thing? I don't mind the idea, but it seems to me like getting knocked down that far would happen very often. Would there be a way to put mutilation at, for example, -30 or does it stop tracking after -10?

I've played with house rules where we used the death threshold as such:
-10-ECL

So a 3rd lvl drow rogue would have a death threshold at -15 instead of -10.

This generally worked rather well in our campaign and also reflects how higher lvl charcter are harder to kill.

[AcadiusLost]

Ah, we may be getting sidetracked a bit- though the PnP references are useful, I knew the 2E ruleset better than 3.0 or 3.5 (ALFA brought me back into the D&D fold, so to speak).

We're talking about the threshold at which a corpse becomes mutilated (and hence un-raise-dead-able). The mechanics for differentiating between the two ("dead body, intact" vs. "dead body, mutilated") are already in place- the thing that would be extra overhead would be tracking the extra information on the corpse- if you need to do 10 points of damage to it before it becomes mutilated, for example, and it's already taken 5, it shouldn't jump back to 10 just because you've set it back down for a breather.

It's do-able, but we're getting into minutia here- adding this stuff may contribute to lag as well, as it'll be more calls to and from the central persistent database whenever the corpse is in a position to be damaged. Most of the time (in live anyway) a dead PC will be a dead PC, and not coming back in the best of circumstances. Would this be worth the effort of adding the additional levels of complexity?

[Joos]

It's do-able, but we're getting into minutia here- adding this stuff may contribute to lag as well, as it'll be more calls to and from the central persistent database whenever the corpse is in a position to be damaged. Most of the time (in live anyway) a dead PC will be a dead PC, and not coming back in the best of circumstances. Would this be worth the effort of adding the additional levels of complexity?

Well, you are going to be doing the brunt of the work anyway, so what do you think?

Seriously, I wouldn't mind the system being as PnPish as possible, but not if its going to ruin my gaming experience with lag, etc.

Here is my proposal, make whatever you want of it:

HP-threshold >1
State: Living

HP-threshold -1
State: Dying

HP-threshold = -10-ECL
State: Dead

HP-threshold = -15-1.5xECL
State: Mutilated

Hope you find some inspiration in that and that my proposal is not too ridiculous.

[Vaelahr]

What about the loot? Does all the gear resist any damage?

[AcadiusLost]

At current, mutilation is just a way to render a corpse more difficult to restore by Raise Dead magic. It can be performed on a corpse that has already been looted, or one that is still carrying it's gear. The gear is not affected, nor does it confer any protection against mutilation. If you're asking about whether gear in a container or on the ground should be affected by damage from things like fireballs and the like, that's a whole other topic. We have some framework in place that could affect things like saving throws for inventory items when their bearer is hit with certain spells and such, but no such system is in development currently. It's another of those things that is possible with enough time and help- but could well be seen as undesirable by the majority of the playerbase even if it were developed.

Are there other IC reasons for mutilation, other than for complicating rez-es? Should it actually hide the identity of the corpse (to confound investigations, for example?)

I'm also hoping we can hear a few others weigh in on the damage counter / area effect ideas- it's not as simple as stretching the HP tracking below -10, as once a PC is "dead"- the PC is moved to the morgue and set at 1 HP (with ghostly effects and such)- it's the placeable corpse that needs to inherit and track damage from then on out (assuming we went with that idea).

Do others have opinions? Joos seems to like the idea generally, GF seems to think just being knocked to -11 shouldn't be sufficient.

[Grand Fromage]

Well, I'm fine with the idea that if you're killed hard enough you're not rezzable by Raise Dead, I just think getting knocked past -10 is too small a threshold. If you're killed you probably have low single digit HP anyway, and a 20-odd damage hit will happen reasonably often at a level where raising is ever going to be an option. Seems to me like you're going to end up with 90% of the corpses mutilated that way.