Removing the "Revolving Door of Death"

[Maleketh]

I'm DMing a new campaign, and I'm looking to make death more meaningful by removing spells that return the dead to life - namely raise dead, resurrection, and true resurrection. I've left in revivify (from the Spell Compendium) as an emergency measure in case something goes sour, and I've made death effects a little less hostile, but my players have still expressed some doubts.

I'd therefore like to ask for suggestions about some compromises I could suggest to make everyone happy. I've considered increasing the time frame allowed to cast revivify (say, within a minute of the subject's death instead of a round), or adding in higher-level variants that do the same, but I want to take some other suggestions that might suit my campaign and/or my players better.

 

[Moggthegob]

Well, I would say that save or die should probably go to save or go unconscious for days.

As for resurrection, I would make it be some sort of quest to bring people back to life, but I would in that case remove level loss as thats the really un-fun part of death is the level loss. Possibly you as the DM could keep the sheets of relevent NPCs for when such things happen, at the risk of derailing your campaign.

 

[nittanytbone]

The old 1E rule where Raise Dead imposes bed rest equal to one day for each day spent dead might help, especially in a fast paced campaign.

You can also force a "resurrection survival" check a la AD&D. Perhaps a CON check DC 5. If the check is failed, you're dead-dead, for real.

Finally, in addition (or instead of) losing a level upon resurrection, you can also subtract 1-2 points of CON.

 

[Arkhandus]

Well, he already said that he's removing the return-from-death spells, excepting only Revivify.

For one thing, I'd say that if those raising spells are gone, then you have to wipe out their death spell counterparts. Death Knell, Slay Living, Destruction, Implosion, and similar. Those last three are just the divine counterparts/reverse versions of Raise Dead, Resurrection, and True Resurrection, so wherever their positive versions go, so too should the negative ones go.

With a partial exception for phantasmal killer, wierd, finger of death, wail of the banshee, power word kill, circle of death, cloudkill, etc. In other words, the ones that fill important slots in the wizard's and sorcerer's repertoire, some at levels where they get little or nothing else at the same spell level from the same school. Have these just render stuff unconscious at -1 hit points instead of killing them, when applicable. Or even, just have it deal nonlethal damage to them equal to their maximum hit points, and lethal damage equal to, say, 1 or 2 points per hit die/character level. That'll render stuff unconscious and slightly wounded, but still recoverable so long as nobody succeeds fully at a coup de grace.

And heck, I'd just remove a few of those spells too, but some of them fill in spots on the spell list where a wizard or sorcerer would get nothing, like Wierd as the only 9th-level illusion (IIRC anyhow) in the Player's Handbook.

Lastly, though, keep in mind that several monsters have death attacks and death spells of their own. Either avoid using every monster like that (several of which are core monsters), or do something similar with their death effects like mentioned above for death spells.

 

[Storme]

I have done the same thing in my Campaign.

Realizing that every player makes mistakes, I added a new spell called Torma's Dream. It is basically a version of revivify that can be cast 1 min per caster level after death. The subject and the caster must then convince Torma to raise him. Depending on how well this is roleplayed it may include a quest or even (rarely) abject refusal.

Death is fatal in my Campaign, though it has yet to occur since the game is roleplaying focused and I believe if a character dies it should be meaningful or dramaitic (as the Editor who created Revivify said in Rule Compendium). The Story is the Thing, not the dice rolls and numbers. Still, my game isn't a video game where the players get extra lives. Death means something and is to be carefully avoided. Telling the rogue to test the trap and not to worry because you have a true rez memorized eliminates the danger. Hehe.

Add raise dead with a short term effective casting time like I did with Torma's Dream if you insist. Don't let the players who have gotten used to the Incredibly High Recycleable Mortality Rate that is D&D influence your decision. YOU (and I) know the game won't be about death. Before long they'll get it.

To me the high mortality/recycle rate is one of the major flaws that D&D still has.

 

[Maldor]

in my game i went the other way i made them cheaper i cut all of there metrial cost by 5
see i don't want to be constanly bringing in new character the group has a background them grow up together they are life long buddys thats why them risk there lifes for and with each other i don't like the idea of poeple meeting in a bar and then just over night trustand risking there lifes with each other overnight it just fits better for me if they comeback

 

[XCorvis]

Steal an idea from another game - Warhammer FRP, I think? Players get 3 tokens. If they're about to die, they spend their token and they miraculously live even when they should have died.

Obviously, this involves a large bit of DM fiat, so make sure your players know they might wind up as revenants, horribly cursed with lycanthropy, and other fates only slightly better than death...

 

[Doug McCrae]

Increase the -10 threshold. It's much too low for mid-high levels anyway. Maybe -20 at lvl 6, -30 at 11, -40 at 16.

 

[eamon]

I use a fortitude saving throw vs. 1/2 the negative hitpoints instead of a hard and fast "real death" threshold, together with a fixed 4-round (5 saving throw) stabilization period. I do this to prevent metagaming (since you never know when someone will die), and to allow a much larger grace period at higher levels, and to use a more standard d20 mechanic instead of the normal rules. It also makes high-fortitude characters a bit more resilient.

Note that you might think the DC is low, but since you need to succeed on 5 successive saving throws (one when you drop, and another at a DC one higher each round), even if you only fail on a natural one, then you have a 1 in 4 chance of dying. If your first throw would fail on a 2 (and thus you last on a 6 or higher) you have a 2 in 3 chance of dying.

It motivates allies to help dropped characters quickly rather than leaving them on the ground since they're either way too dead (beyond -9) or have a few rounds anyhow.

The detailed motivations and more precise description of this mechanic is in the link in my sig (open the spoiler). I think it helps keep things dramatic, and yet cut down on PC deaths!

 

[Rvdvelden]

In our high level Planescape campaign, True Resurrection is 'easy' to come by, and the DM didn't want to change the flavour of the campaign by suddenly restricting it's use.

Instead, he and a couple of the players came up with a reasonable way to compensate for it. Each time someone dies, he will go to the afterlife (paradise, heaven, etc.). As it's very nice there (being paradise and all), if the character is called out to return to the planar life, he will have to make a Will Save to avoid the compelling thought of staying in the afterlife. It starts with a DC 5 + half character level (something that most of us only will fail with a natural 1). Each time a character dies again and gets to the afterlife, the DC is increased with 5. So after two or three deaths of 1 character, he'll probably stick around in afterlife anyway.

By the way, the Will Save is unmodified, so only base save + wisdom mod. No trinkets to buff the save beyond that, in order to get ridiculous high plusses on the saves.

This way the players are very careful not to let their character die, lest they face the chance of having to make a new character (with the level loss that comes with that). So avoiding lethality in combat is still a big issue to us.