Alternate Dieing Rules

[DMFTodd]

How about this as a house rule for dieing:

Rather than lose a level, a character that is died and brought back is treated as a having a temporary level drain: -1 to all skill, ability, saving throws, effective level (for spell casters, i.e. determining how many dice in your fireball). The characters XP total goes down to the 1/2 way point of the previous level but all his attributes and abilities are still at the higher level. The -1 penalty is removed once he regains his level in XP points.

So, a 6th level PC:
1) An umberhulk kills him. He gets raised. He's still a 6th level character - no changes to the character sheet. He takes a -1 on all die rolls as described above. His XP total is halfway between 5th and 6th.

2) He's killed by again and gets raised again. He's still a 6th level character - no changes to the character sheet. He takes a -2 on all die rolls. His XP total is halfway between 4th and 5th.

When he makes enough XP to achieve 5th level, the die roll penalty goes to -1. When he makes XP for 6th level the die roll penalty is a 0 and he's "normal" now.

This has 2 advantages:
1) You don't have to rework your character sheet which I imagine is quite a pain.

2) You don't have the "I used to be a sorcerer but now I'm not" inconsistency

3) You reduce the players desire to bring in a brand new character

The -1 penalty to all rolls is more of a penalty than losing a level in some regards:

* Your saves are probably worse than they would have been
* Your BAB is probably worse unless you're a figter\
* Skills that you don't spend points on are worse)

But in some ways it is more beneficial:
* You get to keep your feats
* You get to keep ability scores
* You get to keep hit points
* You get to keep spells

Thoughts?

 

[mroberon1972]

Seems usable...

Mr. Oberon
"I drank what?"

 

[Jay Lofstead]

From the SRD:
The character gains one or more negative levels. If the subject has at least as many negative levels as Hit Dice, he dies. Each negative level gives a creature the following penalties: -1 competence penalty on attack rolls, saving throws, skill checks, ability checks, and effective level (for determining the power, duration, DC, and other details of spells or special abilities). Additionally, a spellcaster loses one spell or spell slot from her highest available level. Negative levels stack. Negative levels remain for 24 hours or until removed with a spell. After 24 hours, the afflicted character must attempt a Fortitude save. The DC is 10 + one-half the attacker's Hit Dice + the attacker's Charisma modifier. If the DC succeeds, the negative level dissipates. If not, the negative level is removed, but the character's level is permanently reduced by 1. The afflicted character makes a separate saving throw for each negative level it is has gained.

I think I would want to modify it a bit to be closer to this with just keeping the initial penalties (including the loss of the effective caster level). Making it named a "Negative level" would also be good for stacking purposes.

 

[SylverFlame]

Jay, is that an exact quote? I'm wondering because if you add the charisma modifier to the DC, isn't that penalizing a character for a high ability score? I always thought of that as a no-no. Could it be minus their charisma modifier instead?

 

[Destil]

The worst thing about the current death rules is that it's horridly bad on someone who was just about to gain a level, and easy on someone who just gained one.

For example:
PC1 - 2999 XP
PC2 - 1000 XP
Both are 2nd level. If they both die each now has 500 XP. PC1 looses 500 XP, PC2 looses 2499 XP, or almost 5x as much.

Personaly, I use an XP debt system, and just assign an XP debt equal to (current level*500) that needs to be paid off before they begin getting XP, rather than removing XP.

 

[Bhaal]

Jay, is that an exact quote? I'm wondering because if you add the charisma modifier to the DC, isn't that penalizing a character for a high ability score? I always thought of that as a no-no. Could it be minus their charisma modifier instead?

It's the attacker's charisma. The quote is talking about negative levels that an undead would give its victim.

I also use the "debt" system. Well, while we're on it, the way we do exp is add up what we get and have a goal for each level. This is best used in an example. Take joe, a 1st level character:

Joe just starts out and needs 1000 exp to achieve level 2 (which is a 1000 xp goal). After an adventure he gets 1400 exp. He subtracts the goal for level 2 (1000) from his total, he is now level 2 and has 400 experience left over. Next is 3rd level, which needs 2000 experience to achieve. Later on he gets 2500 experience and has a total of (2500+400=) 2900. Subtract 2000 and he is now 3rd level with 900 exp, needing 3000 to level again.

It's the same as what's in the PHB, but a different way of calculating it. The algorythm simply put is you need your level * 1000 experience to get to the next level. When you do, subtract that total from your experience and level up. It's easier to keep track of the math later on. Say you're 16th level going on 17th. Instead of keeping track of, say, 129,302 experience and heading towards 136,000, your numbers will just be 9302 out of 16000. Easier to figure out percentages, easier to quickly gague your progress, and generally keeps the numbers simple.

Anyway, combine that system with a debt system, and when someone loses a level, you subtract their level * 500 from their total and don't change anything else. If you want, you can make a rule that if their experience goes into the negatives, they start taking -1 penalties to everything.

 

[SylverFlame]

Thanks for the clarification Bhaal.

 

[Jay Lofstead]

Yes, I cut that directly from the opengamingfoundation.org site.

I like the XP debt idea. We have had several times where people died right around when they would level (myself included). We have house-ruled that you can choose to get your experience for the encounter that kills you either before or after raise dead in order to help minimize the impact. I think this takes it to a nicer place. I'll have to keep it in mind for my group.

 

[Kyramus]

I let my players keep their levels. No loss or negative to hit or anything, but they loose XP.

A level 10 that died, would looks 10-1=9*1000=9000 xp. If he died again he looses another 9k xp.
He needs to make up for the XP before he can level again.

It seems to work fine and no one complains as they don't want a negative level or a drop in con.

 

[Frostmarrow]

Personaly, I use an XP debt system, and just assign an XP debt equal to (current level*500) that needs to be paid off before they begin getting XP, rather than removing XP.

I think this is the way to go. I tried a year ago to convince my group that we should use this system but they didn't like it. Instead they opted to go with a permanent -1 to a randomly determined stat. It's a stupid system but we still use it. Maybe I should call for a re-vote now...