Does looting a fallen foe count as grave robbery?

[TheArcaneWeirdo]

I mean for Power Check purposes.
Cause one the one hand, it always feels icky to me when we finish a battle and a player just checks the corpse for treasures. It feels cold-hearted - do you not even care you just killed someone?
But on the other hand, there are very few parties who don't do that. it's just practical. How else would you get resources mid-adventure? It's a common practice even in real-world armies. But does everyone doing it make it right?
So do you think it should require a power check?

[Mistmaster]

No Power Checks. It is pragmatism.

[Joël of the FoS]

Short answer: no

Long answer: noooo.

A DM who does that will frustrate his players.

If you really want to go that way, you can force your players to bury their kills, with proper rites, before looting them.

[Mephisto of the FoS]

If you really want to go that way, you can force your players to bury their kills, with proper rites, before looting them.

I guess you mean bury them after looting, cause if they loot them after burial then it is grave robbing...

[Joël of the FoS]

Yes, in that order

[Mephisto of the FoS]

In general I would be careful when to make a Powers Check and wouldn't follow the rules per se, as if it happens regularly it loses its impact. When I was younger I had a player who was so excited failing a Powers Check and after the first failed one he would constantly do things to get amass as many as he could, just to see what his character would become. Although I understand the fun in that, it messed up my game and the atmosphere I was trying to create.

[brothersale]

i would say no unless it is a rare case of the PCs killing a innocent or surrendered foe or something similar

[Rock of the Fraternity]

There's a difference between claiming the spoils of battle, when you risked your life, and violating a resting place of the dead.
If you're locked in mortal combat and win, then the dead guy's belongings are forfeit.
Violating the grave of someone who did you no harm and taking their grave-goods is defilement of a sanctified space as well as theft. And depending on the deceased's culture it may put their soul in peril, because they needed those grave goods to nourish themselves and/or buy their spot in the afterlife.

[TheArcaneWeirdo]

Okay, gotcha. It doesn't. Thanks for answering. You probably saved me from a big DMing mistake.

[TheArcaneWeirdo]

In general I would be careful when to make a Powers Check and wouldn't follow the rules per se, as if it happens regularly it loses its impact. When I was younger I had a player who was so excited failing a Powers Check and after the first failed one he would constantly do things to get amass as many as he could, just to see what his character would become. Although I understand the fun in that, it messed up my game and the atmosphere I was trying to create.

Honestly, there should be adventures around that concept. Usually I only play good characters and try very hard to avoid unnecessary violence in the game, but once you have a whole part of the world-building that's about the magical consequences of evil deeds, and you make it diverse and interesting... We should be exploring that. It's something the party needs to agree on from the beginning (one murder-hobo in a group of noble heroes always ends in shouts around the table), but there should be a place for that.
I'm thinking about a campaign themed around the question 'when does a man become a monster', where to achieve their goal, the party needs to use increasingly fouler means - where will they put the line? Will they give up, find a third option, or go further and further down the path of corruption?