"Clone" undervalued as a Raise Dead substitute?

[Felix]

Since, IIRC, clone only brings you back to one level behind the point your sample comes from, they had regular samples taken.

I didn't read that from the spell description...

"... treat the clone as if it were the original character raised from the dead, including the loss of one level..."

Is this what you're citing to say that a clone's level is the level at which the clone was made?

 

[Lord_Fergus]

I didn't read that from the spell description...

Is this what you're citing to say that a clone's level is the level at which the clone was made?

I believe (I haven't confirmed it though) that this is the difference between the spell in 3.0 and 3.5 or maybe that was an even earlier edition of the spell.

 

[Shard O'Glase]

It doesn't suck its just boring and really only useful for the DM to create continuing villans or to stop TPKs. For Pcs sure its a bit cheaper than raise dead, but since its an 8th level spell not to far down the line you can just true res and that's a ton better.

 

[dcollins]

-- 1000gp material component, 1/5th the price of Raise Dead.

Part of this is a result of the piecemeal tinkering that took place in 3.5, with things getting revised out-of-sync with other things.

In 3.0:
- raise dead was only 500 gp, half the cost of clone.
- clone did indeed bring back someone at the level they were when the sample was taken (same as previous rulesets).

From 3.0 SRD:

The clone has the personality, memories, skills, and levels the original had at the time the piece of flesh was taken. However, the replacement must be at least one level lower than the original was at the time of death...