Does reincarnation even make sense?

[Halaster-Blackcloak]

Garhkal wrote:

But that's the thing. It was made as a way along with raise dead/resurrection, for players to keep their characters continuing on..

I would argue that it fails horribly in that aspect, for several reasons.

First, you need a 12th level wizard for reincarnation or a 14th level priest for reincarnate. But you only need a 9th level priest to gain access to raise dead. Far easier to find a priest to cast raise dead.

Second, in many cases the reincarnated character does not gain a PC/class-able character. Using the wizard version (reincarnation), there is a 47% chance the player will come back as an evil, non-classed race (ogre, orc, bugbear, goblin, etc). Going BTB, these characters cannot have a class. That means no xp, no leveling, etc. The new PC will essentially be a monster.

Third, the priest spell reincarnate is even worse. There is a 50% chance the PC is coming back as an animal (badger, stag, etc), which again means no class, no leveling, etc. Worse yet, the newly incarnated PC is at best a pet. It cannot wear armor, wield weapons, and so on - as opposed to a bugbear, orc, or even a goblin. There's an additional 14% chance the new character is a forest being such as a faun or a pixie. Again, not an adventuring race or able to have a class. There is an overall 64% chance the character is not coming back as a character who can have a class and therefore gain levels.

Fourth, while the reincarnated PC can gain his original form and class via a wish, the wish itself - by its very definition - renders the reincarnate/reincarnation spell(s) irrelevant and unnecessary.

So it doesn't really allow a character to "continue on". It allows the player to play a monster or an animal. They can forget casting spells, wielding weapons, using weapons, using magic items, gaining levels, etc, etc. They forgo everything that makes a PC a PC. Which is why I think it makes far more sense to simply create a table of the various PC races along with some races the DM deems acceptable to use as PC classes, and simply allow the spirit of the reincarnate being to determine class and alignment. That makes more logical sense both in-game and mechanics-wise than anything else.

[Halaster-Blackcloak]

Also, the idea that a reincarnated character loses the ability to qualify for a particular class makes no sense. Again, what is being reincarnated?

The spirit of the being who died.

"With this spell, the priest can bring back a dead person in another body..."
- PHB, pg. 234

The dead person's spirit now inhabits a new body. However, alignment in AD&D is determined by behavior, not form. If this were not the case, then a human paladin who is shape-changed or polymorphed into any non-human race would cease to be a paladin. But that doesn't happen. So alignment is dictated by behavior. A LG paladin who is always faithfully LG and who comes back in orc form should not lose paladinhood because he is still LG.

We can see this argument backed further by simply looking at the magic jar spell. If an evil wizard magic jars a paladin, he is no longer a paladin...

"The alignment of the host or receptacle is that of the occupying life force."
- PHB, pg. 170

Again, the spirit or soul determines the alignment - the physical form is irrelevant.

Looking at it objectively, the reincarnate/reincarnation spell(s) simply make no sense.

[garhkal]

Garhkal wrote:

But that's the thing. It was made as a way along with raise dead/resurrection, for players to keep their characters continuing on..

I would argue that it fails horribly in that aspect, for several reasons.

First, you need a 12th level wizard for reincarnation or a 14th level priest for reincarnate. But you only need a 9th level priest to gain access to raise dead. Far easier to find a priest to cast raise dead.

BUT as alreay pointed out, ELVES can't be raised...

Second, in many cases the reincarnated character does not gain a PC/class-able character. Using the wizard version (reincarnation), there is a 47% chance the player will come back as an evil, non-classed race (ogre, orc, bugbear, goblin, etc). Going BTB, these characters cannot have a class. That means no xp, no leveling, etc. The new PC will essentially be a monster.

In 1e that's true. BUT 2e does allow it, via the Humanoids handbook (or skills and powers).

I'd always thought of reincarnation as being the poor man's resurrection. However, looking back at the phb, they're both level 7 spells, so I'm somewhat mistaken there. If it were a lower level spell, I think it would make more sense (at least in gamist terms), and also in terms of potentially using more 'natural' means to bring someone back, if reincarnation (in the traditional sense) is a real thing in your world.

But if you look at it.. A priest gets access to L7 spells at 16th level, and ONLY if he has a 18 wisdom. He also needs to have 2,115,000 experience at the least to get that.

A druid who gets access to reincarnate as a 7th level spell, ONLY needs to be L12 to get that, which puts him at 300,000 to 750,000 experience (WELL earlier), has NO mention of needing a 18 wis or not, while mages get it as a 6th level spell (12th needed for it) which puts them at a min of 750,001 xp.. OVER what the L12 druid is.. So they are not all on the 'same plane' even if they are the same level (or one level lower for the mage version).

[garhkal]

Again, the spirit or soul determines the alignment - the physical form is irrelevant.

Looking at it objectively, the reincarnate/reincarnation spell(s) simply make no sense.

SPirit/soul does determine alignment. BUT ITS the body that determines class..

[Halaster-Blackcloak]

Garhkal wrote:

BUT as alreay pointed out, ELVES can't be raised...

True, but how does that change all the other stuff I wrote? And they can still be resurrected, via spell or device.

In 1e that's true. BUT 2e does allow it, via the Humanoids handbook (or skills and powers).

If the DM uses those optional rules, sure. And in this case I would suggest using them. But that still doesn't change the fact that a PC reincarnated as a stag or a badger cannot have a class, gain levels, wield magical items/weapons/armor, etc., or that the PC reincarnated as a humanoid cannot have a class, gain levels, etc. Unless the DM uses additional, optional rules to allow it. But why the need for additional, optional rules to make the spell work?

But if you look at it.. A priest gets access to L7 spells at 16th level, and ONLY if he has a 18 wisdom. He also needs to have 2,115,000 experience at the least to get that.

I think you're missing my point. All of that is irrelevant to what I'm saying. Cutting out any extraneous detail, the bottom line I'm getting at is that reincarnation doesn't really work well because in most cases the PC is coming back as either an animal (and therefore becomes a pet, not a PC), or as a class that cannot have a class and therefore cannot be a PC. Granted, the DM can always allow that (as in your 2E Humanoids Handbook example), but assuming the DM is playing 1E or 2E without the Humanoid Handbook, the spell doesn't function well. Remember, the spell existed in 1E, long before the 2E Humanoid Handbook came out. So this discussion could just as easily be taking place 30+ years ago, before that option existed.

A druid who gets access to reincarnate as a 7th level spell, ONLY needs to be L12 to get that, which puts him at 300,000 to 750,000 experience (WELL earlier), has NO mention of needing a 18 wis or not, while mages get it as a 6th level spell (12th needed for it) which puts them at a min of 750,001 xp.. OVER what the L12 druid is.. So they are not all on the 'same plane' even if they are the same level (or one level lower for the mage version).

Again, all that is fine and dandy, but it doesn't change the fact that in most cases the PC is not coming back as a playable PC class. If he comes back as an animal, he cannot be a PC. If he comes back as a humanoid, he cannot be a PC - unless you use supplemental rules to allow that. If you need something outside the core rules to make the spell work, it's a poorly designed spell. It should work well within the core rules, as it is a core rule itself.

SPirit/soul does determine alignment. BUT ITS the body that determines class..

I have to completely disagree there. If that's the case, then please explain why a druid who is shapechanged or a paladin who is polymorphed does not change class. If physical body alone determines class, then evil humans should be able to be paladins. They can't. On top of that, we're not just talking about "orcs can't be paladins", even though it's the fact that orcs are evil and they have a societal outlook that doesn't allow it (same as how good/neutral elves cannot be paladins because of societal quirks). We're talking about reincarnating the spirit, the soul of a paladin who is LG and holy/pure enough to be a paladin. Changing his physical shape should have no bearing on his fitness to be a paladin. His god should not strip him of his powers just because he is now in the form of an orc or a gnome, anymore than the god would strip the paladin of his powers if the paladin were polymorphed. Makes no sense.

[Halaster-Blackcloak]

Forgot something...

So let's assume that we're playing 2E (not 1E) and the DM allows optional rules, including the Humanoid Handbook. Let's further assume that the PC reincarnates as a humanoid race eligible for a PC class. There's a problem now. If the DM is allowing orcs and orges and goblins to have classes, he now pretty much has to design his monsters to have classes, similarly to 3E. Surely the reincarnated PC cannot be the only goblin on the planet able to have a class. So now he has to have goblin shamans and orge fighters and bugbear thieves and what not. The fact that the spell needs an entire optional rule book to make it work shows us that the spell is poorly designed. Otherwise, it wouldn't need this additional info. And it now also complicates the game for the DM. Maybe he doesn't want orc fighters and bugbear thieves and goblin wizards running around his campaign world ala 3E.

Second, even if the DM uses the additional, supplemental, optional rulebook to allow humanoid classed PCs, the PC can still reincarnate as a fox or a stag or a badger, in which case the use of the Humanoid Handbook rules don't amount to anything - the reincarnated PC cannot be a PC. The problem still exists even with the addition of an entire book of optional rules.

I'm tellin' ya, the spell is broken!

[Halaster-Blackcloak]

Lyrwik wrote:

However, the thing I always thought was odd about it, was that it's not really reincarnation. Reincarnation implies being born as something new. This would make for a cool spell, if you could cause someone to be reborn - at least for NPCs. For example, imagine there being some powerful, evil wizard who gets reincarnated each time he dies, and thus seems to rise again and again through the ages, each time in a different form. However, I can't imaging anyone having much fun, having their character sit out for 15+ years of in-game time while their newly reincarnated human baby grows up.

True, it's not technically even reincarnation as most people understand it. The new character comes into being already matured, not as a baby. Like you said, that would definitely not work! Well...perhaps in a long enough campaign where time in the campaign world went by pretty quickly. Even then it'd be hard to use.

Back to what I said about it not really being reincarnation - the way I interpret what the spell is doing, it's either:
creating a new body for the soul/consciousness to occupy; or
there's some other poor sod who was just hanging around, and has now just had their soul/consciousness displaced by the PC's.

The spell seems to imply the former. Otherwise it would be a magic jar spell, going with the latter.

Either of these could be fine as level 7 spells, but they're not really reincarnation. This second one I can also see as potentially a pretty cool spell, and something which I'm sure I've seen in various games/movies/books, where the evil guy wants to transfer their soul/consciousness into some young strapping lad/lass, thus continuing their eternal life

In a campaign that goes on long enough, it actually might be doable. Or in a campaign where the campaign ends for some reason, and the next one takes place in a future where the reincarnated PC is now grown mature enough to attain a class.

This is why I think the only really workable solution is to allow the PC to be reincarnated fully grown, as per the spell, but restrict the possible incarnations to PC races available to have classes, and perhaps humanoids. Then allow the PC to maintain its class, since the spirit and alignment are unchanged. This also allows some really interesting roleplaying issues - imagine the challenge of a paladin reincarnated as an orc, and having to find a way to prove himself to others despite his appearance, for example.

I swear, next to demi-human level limits (and perhaps 2E spell damage caps), I think reincarnate/reincarnation is one of the most broken, poorly designed rules in the entire AD&D game.