Alternatives to Save or Die

[Geron Raveneye]

An alternative that has been mentioned already would be a "Save or die slowly" (cue mad laughter here) effect, akin to the good old laser scene from Goldfinger. Basically, the effect starts taking your Con down round by round for a certain amount, either variable or fixed, and if nothing is done to stop the effect (break eye contact, kill the monster, etc) the victim will die after a time. That same effect could be used for save-or-petrify (dealing Dex damage instead of Con).

One point why I'd prefer the new system NOT to remake save-or-die into huge amounts of hit point damage is because it reminds me too much of those silly scenes of old when a DM tried to surefire-kill a character by declaring he got hit by a 10-ton rock and suffered 50.000 points of damage, save for half, because he got too many protests before when simply declaring a character dead from such a hit. Inflated numbers simply have a silly aftertaste to me, chalk it up to personal prejudice.

The element I'd like to retain is the ability to integrate monsters into the game that have the outright ability to kill anything mortal with a glance, no matter how powerful. Doling out hundreds of hit points may have the same result, but it simply doesn't have the same flavour. To me, of course. Others will (and have) disagree.

That's as far as I'm going to post in here, since I've elaborated my opinion on this enough in the other thread about this topic.

 

[erf_beto]

I thought they said something indicating that some save-or-die effects would only work on bloodied targets. That would seem to preserve some of the sudden-death aspect of save-or-dies while still giving the players a chance to affect their fates.

I dont know if this is official, but that's the way I see it.

I guess things that were supposed to kill you instantly are now hp damage, and everything else will be a condition that can be removed (magically or not), like charmed, poisoned, slowed, or that takes some time to evolve into a critical state. Like petrification: at the first round, your legs become rigid and your speed is reduced to half; at round two, your torso is covered in stone and you're held in one place; round three, you cant use your arms anymore, only scream; round four, only your eyes are not covered in stone; and by round five, you are a sentient statue. One day in this condition and you become unconscious stone... (or maybe this is just too complex for the 'easy to run' game that 4E seems to be)

 

[Li Shenron]

3. Rewarding Reconnaissance and Preparation
Characters should gain some advantage for taking the trouble to find out about the creatures they are going to face. In particular, if the creature has a dangerous attack, they might be able to prepare a specific counter to it. Instead of the dangerous attack automatically meaning death, it could deal major damage (see point 1, above), disable (see point 2, above), or impose some other significant penalty such as a -4 to all d20 rolls.

What others can you think of?

I think this is the winning choice for me. Don't use save-or-die effects in random encounters or casual traps. Spare them for climatic encounters at the end of an adventure, and the characters will have gathered enough information to protect them at least partially, or have a backup plan in case someone is effected (Contingency, for example).

 

[JDJblatherings]

some sort of "Save or Die Slowly" is betetr by my reckoning because:

1. folks notice, it isn't just "oh bob is dead, does he still have that potion we got last session in his backpack?"
2. the player of the dying charcter isn't going to let the other players forget they are dying.
3. people will attmept to save the character that is passing slowly.
4. folks that are dieing slowly get to try and pull off a cinematic last blow or some other such action.

 

[Quartz]

I like the Save or Stat Drain method.

 

[Lanefan]

some sort of "Save or Die Slowly" is betetr by my reckoning because:

1. folks notice, it isn't just "oh bob is dead, does he still have that potion we got last session in his backpack?"
2. the player of the dying charcter isn't going to let the other players forget they are dying.
3. people will attmept to save the character that is passing slowly.
4. folks that are dieing slowly get to try and pull off a cinematic last blow or some other such action.

Dying slowly is way worse than dying quickly if the death is still inevitable...if my character's going to die anyway, just kill it and get it over with!

Your point #4, however, is a serious mark in slow-death's favour.

Lanefan