One of the things we have to face is the fact that, quite simply, nobody wants to die and stay dead. People have a hard time letting go of their characters. And with as easy a way of returning to life as getting true resurrection from one of the powerful clerics for free (which, I believe, has 25,000 gold of material components involved in the casting, which nobody seems to care about) it's commonplace to be back five minutes later (which, by the way, is less than the casting time for that spell). And those who don't have access to clerics, instead of accepting defeat, come up with things like "Oh, I can't die until I've fulfilled my oath." Those who don't have an actual reason to come back need to stay dead, not pull things like say their death was only a rumor when it had, originally, actually happened.
Another thing to take into account is the fact that, if you're good-aligned, you'll likely enjoy your afterlife, and may not want to come back. Such things should be balanced against what your character has to live for before deciding to come back. To my fellow players of outsider characters, remember - outsiders cannot be resurrected by any normal means. I'm sure that that means nothing to anyone except that they'll need to take an oath or the like so that they can come back, or that they'll just get recreated in their home plane and sent right back here, but unless someone has a good, verifiable, rules-compatible reason to bring him back, if Itz dies, he's dead. And I hope that somebody else - for once - will do the same and stay dead.
To those who really don't want to lose their characters, please, just don't fight, and if you have to, run away when things look bad. There's a reason people in combat have, for the last few thousand years, retreated when the fight turned against them. Live to fight another day without being a snert or yet another free resurrection. At the very least, pay back the cleric - even the most kind-hearted and wealthy healer will be hard-pressed to keep paying for all the diamond dust.
I expect this thread to have absolutely no effect on the game whatsoever, though, no matter what people say here. People just don't want their chars to stay dead.
