If a paladin dies in battle but his companions are still in danger what happens...

If a paladin dies in battle but his companions are still in danger what happens? What sort of things should a GM do to make sure the paladin's faith to their god and loyalty to their companions last beyond the grave?

Let him get a few last words in, and if it's a good one, everyone benefits from a bardsong as if the Paladin was a bard of his level.

Nothing. Heroes die. Everybody dies. That's the natural order of things.
Siegfried died. Hercules died. King Arthur died. They were all great men, who accomplished great deeds, but in the end they were humans, and humans are mortal.

Depends if you feel like a nice DM and want to give paladin some final rounds of fighting before death sets in
For me you'd just be dead because everything you did before that point was godly assistance, so why the fuck would it suddenly give you more? Doesn't that mean you are too weak/foolish to win that fight?

For a good aligned paladin I would have their corpse fall, and upon hitting the ground hissoul is flung to the afterlife with such a force that some of the positive energy of that place leaks through, effectively channeling positive energy to heal allies with the strength equal to their level (as if a cleric)+How many major tasks they've completed for their God.
If they're evil then it channels negative energy to damage their foes as above.
If they're neutral they get nothing.

>Literally the only person in this topic who gets it.

I agree with this.

The graveyards are full of indespensable men.

Their god would most likely allow a "roll-to-res" like all (skull-faced) dullahan.

You can make it more interesting by making the god dependant on the roll. This would allow a paladin to become ressed by some asshole god he doesn't even worship and be forced to equip a lance instead of the usual sword with alchemist properties.

>King Arthur died
I absolutely agree with your point, but if we're talking about the King Arthur of myth he fucked off to Avalon.

I like this one.

Depends on the type of game
No-one's getting back up in a GoT style game
Other than maybe showing up once, later, to help in some small way, people die when they are killed in Conan land
High Fantasy Heroes Heroically doing heroic deeds? The paladin may get to finish out the fight as some living martyr thing. Then gone.
Book of exalted deeds actually HAD a prestige class called living martyr
Gandalf The White was basically this
Warhammer probably wouldn't have this, except for when it does, but that usually involves chaos shenanigans.
Sisters of Battle in 40K might pull that shit from time to time.
Comic Books almost live on this sometimes
Anime does this all day erry day. So maybe a good argument not to do it.
Jesus and the resurrection squad. Some get up faster than others.
And you can many more examples and counter examples throughout fiction

If I were to do it, it would probably be "your will and conviction anchors you to this mortal realm just a while longer, just long enough to see that your companions are safe." battle ends. they're gone. And if some guy actually kills the revenant paladin during the fight then... they're immortal soul just got shredded. So no resurrection later, no wish to come back. they're over-dead now. maybe the damage will be fixed in a century or five

But saying it must always be that way is needlessly tying your hands up.

And why the GM should ensure it and not the paladin himself, again?

Because the player is bound by the rules so when they hit -CON HP they're dead as a doornail and nothing else

What is this shitty shop of Pelinal?

I think what that user meant is that why shouldn't Paladin have thought about that beforehand and made some sort of a covenant with a deity just in case he dies or created an artifact to help himself out, or anything at all really to facilitate that in future instead of a GM asspull.

Paladins have basically no ability to craft items. The paladin, like players, don't think about character death until they're bloodied.

I actually have a table set up for divine magic users that depending on their class and god/path weird shit happens upon their death. The only thing tethering that divine power to the material plane has been slain that magics gonna do something.

There's a low percentage for them to come back, and there's a low percentage for them to come back wrong.

I also have a table for arcane users, but it mostly results in explosions/wild magic

But in direct response to your question not much, most settings have a "yer dead jim" clause in the rules and most gods aren't particular to exerting effort for free

If the paladin wants to make sure his "faith to their god and loyalty to their companions last beyond the grave", they should leave a lasting legacy and a history of good deeds. Or at least be remembered as a good person, through actions.

Cheating death is for cowards.

Let his auras persist for 1d4 hours.

Paladins of ilmater are brought back if they perform a selfless, ultimate sacrifice of the self for the sake of others. Martyrdom is legit as fuck to Ilmater.

>playing a paladin
>GM rolls for divine intervention all the fucking time, after all my actions, be it killing enemies or going to get wasted in a bar
>the deity actually comes down, tries to slap my shit but every time I point the GM to the tenets of my faith and oath which I'm not even remotely breaking, so it fucks off
>die in combat due to a stray crossbow quarrel
>"yer dead jim lol"

>What sort of things should a GM do
One thing I like is the idea of some liches not becoming undead by unspeakable rites that require the death if innocent virgins or something, but because they were so engrossed and dedicated in some goal that they never noticed they passed on. Like how ghosts haunt their old lives because they never noticed they died.

Basically the GM needs to implement some sort of procedure for spontaneously arising undead that could apply to a Paladin being wounded in fatally wounded in battle and denying it.

Whether this happening is an act of his god or not would be sort of uncertain like modern day miracles (an unlikely occurrence still within the bounds of physics, were the dice lucky, or greased by a higher power) unless the god speaks up, because GM rolls are private, don't you know!

He rises up, and now all the damage he takes is a + bonus to hit and for damage. (only heals can stop him)

Fuck not with the dead knight.

RISE FROM YOUR GRAVE!

Imagine this:
>paladin dies in battle
>but the sheer amount of willpower keeps the paladin's soul shackled in the rotting corpse - it refuses to give up
>unable to move the dead body, the soul must take radical action
>it cannibalizes part of its soul to gain energy - energy which allows it to give the corpse life again
>resurrected in flesh, the paladin rises again - not whole any more, yet not missing any parts
>no longer a human fighting for justice, but justice in the shape of a man

Now I want to run an evil campaign in which the players are the elite guard of some dark lord tasked with taking out a paladin order, and in the highest tower of the castle they encounter a paladin demilich.

I want to steal this

>demilich
So what most of his physical and metaphysical form reside in the elemental plane of justice?

None of these people were paladins. They couldn't cast spells or Smite Evil or project auras of divine protection.

Stop being retarded.

Have someone else come to carry the flame.

If a Paladin of god X dies and his party is still in danger, the god dispatches another of his servants nearby to aid them in the fallen warrior's stead... long enough for them to roll up a new PC.

>paladins subsisting after death
>no one mentions the oathkeepers
C'mon son

That's what you got for being a paladin of the god of assholes.

DELETE THIS, KING ARTHUR WILL BE BACK THE ONCE AND FUTURE KING IS NOT DEAD HE'S JUST RESTING

>But saying it must always be that way is needlessly tying your hands up.
Why should the paladin in particular get special treatment? Do you let all your players go nova for five rounds before dying permanently with no chance of revival? If so what is the justification of this? Can any person do this? Do enemies do this? Is it just the heroes because they are special snowflakes?

Honestly this is why I like fate points and other reroll rules. You can use them to pull yourself out of a risky situation or you can ensure that if you die you go out in a blaze of glory.
>Paladin has several broken ribs, is missing an arm, and bleeding out
>Says fuck it and dumps everything into his final attack using a divine smite for each attack and a spell smite for one of them
>Paladin nearly kills the target outright but collapses dead

Daily reminder that if King Arthur returns he is going to slaughter all of the Saxons and Picts.

>Why should the paladin in particular get special treatment?
He shouldn't. If he comes back/sticks around it should be in a way that also occurs to other with a similar profile. Like other high level famous people, or servants of higher powers good & evil, or have a Will save of +XX and roll naturally high/a 20 on the die. And/or get killed on especially hallowed/cursed ground.

Basically could you see this happening to a devout opponent of the PC without them crying foul?

But I am the guy who is a fan of the dead sometimes not passing on through natural processes.

HA! As if he can deal with the greatest threat of all time the motherfucking Normans

A hand wielding the holy sword.
Great.

Not the one you replied to, but stop making every hero a paladin.
Siegfried killed a dragon, but was roguish and more involved in intrigue than battles for faith and good. Hercules was clearly a good, yet misguided barbarian who got a fuckton of quests and little reward.
King Arthur is the only one who actually has oaths of chivalry, nobility and righteousness.
It's actually a legend that he'll rise, should England be in danger. It fits.

>Hercules died
That resulted in him ascending to full divinity though.

>Why should the paladin in particular get special treatment?
Because his class is the only one where you can easily lose all your magical abilities for seemingly arbitrary reasons. A wizard can kill a country or create a utopia and he won't lose his powers either way.

>only one where you can easily lose all your magical abilities for seemingly arbitrary reasons
Yeah, but their class is more powerful then normal to take that into account!
...
Yeah, that was a joke.
The designers should have made "Only the honor of a paladin is unbreakable - even by death itself" Into a class feature.

Why are Paladins of Hera surprised at being treated with constant suspicion and never getting support from their god?

You know the subrace Reventant from Unearthed Arcana of 5th ed D&D?
That is what happens.

I think it's not specifically the Paladin in general. However if the Paladin was to go ABOVE and BEYOND his duties. Say you have a character who did the bare minimum to stay a Paladin, to stay on the light. He gets his reward in the after life etc etc.

Someone who lives every day by their code, no evil deed going unpunished, actively throwing themselves into the throes of danger because one more good deed could still be done, not getting enough sleep due to helping others, fasting not out of a holy order but because he keeps giving his food to the hungry and those who needs it more, an absolute iconic paragon who actively suffers in life with a smile and good grace because he wishes to make this World just that tiny bit better for all involved.

That sort of man, upon his death, well... as a GM, his enemies would know his God's wrath in a manner symbolic of said God.

For example, peaceful protector, a divine wall protects all his allies while even though the Paladin is dead, his will stays and his will manifests as a holy defensive shield.

If he is a Holy Knight type, if evil is there taunting, then he becomes a partial living avatar of his God.

Etc etc.

These would not be indefinite but would only last a certain amount of rounds or for a period of time completely dependent on the player's roleplaying and character choices up to the moment of his death to see if his deemed worthy enough of such divine honour.

I always wondered what happened to Poiroit in the end.

I had something like this in a Dark heresy game I ran, a Daemon Bane Eviscerator that had belonged to a cleric of the emperor who's hatred for the daemons was so pure and intense that he didn't die until the daemonic incursion he was fighting was beaten back.

And that trait was put into the sword, if it was in your hands and you were fighting daemons, nothing short of total anhilation could drop you (functionally you gained "the stuff of nightmares" trait). Made for an excellent confrontation with the greater daemon archenemy of the campaign at the end

I've played a paladin before who followed Bahamut's teachings to the detail, he would be the ideal paladin, and before the campaign ended we faced the BBEG, a group of 5 facing down an ancient red dragon who was an inch too close to summoning tiamat, anyway, midway during the fight the dragon managed to drop me to -220 hp due to his minions and his fire breath in one round, killing me. The DM described the heavens being torn open, a thunderbolt striking my dead flaming body.
I rose up as a flaming paladin adorned with wings. It was pretty rad.
In this case I could've died and the fight would've continued and the BBEG would have probably still died, but it seemed more appropriate to give my character an actual divine aspect as him being a 20th level paladin

The point was not that they were paladins, but that they were great heroes and died anyway. Even Hercules, who was a demigod.

NORMANS GET OUT REEEEEEEEEEE

Yes, Hercules, who then ascended to godhood through divine intervention-- something that can happen to Paladins.

>That sort of man, upon his death, well... as a GM, his enemies would know his God's wrath in a manner symbolic of said God.
Which is kind of unfair to the other characters.
>Be fighter
>Have a long and bloody adventure, see people die, slay horrible monsters and people
>Paladin and I fighting off a horde of enemies
>Paladin on the verge of death is imbued with light and gains significantly more powerful abilities before keeling over dead
>A long time later I help hold off a horde of Orcs while civilians flee to safety
>Perforated by two dozen arrows, a mountain of dead Orcs are at my feet
>Die face down in the mud ingloriously

I wouldn't mind it if it was a specific class ability, like Paladins lose some shit and have the ability to become an avatar of their god (or justice if you are playing 5e because paladins specifically get their power from oaths and could even be atheists) and after X time they burn out.
eg.
>Strength becomes 30
>All other abilities become 20 unless they are already above 20
>Regains all spell slots and sacred oath ability
>Heal up to 5x paladin level HP
>Cannot be healed through any means after this
>Radiate bright light within 30 feet and dim light within 60 feet
>Resistant to non-magic piercing, slashing, or bludgeoning damage, immune to radiant damage
>Movement speed is doubled
>Upon reaching zero hitpoints or a number of rounds equal to the paladin's level/2 (to a minimum of 1) the light emanating from the paladin fades and the paladin collapses
>The paladin is dead and his very soul has been destroyed, he cannot be revived through any means