Death and the Fixing of It

[Savage Jim]

In our group, high character mortality plus low chance of character resurrection eventually equals shallow, disposable characters.

Ah! See, you've made an assumption that is undeniably bound to lead to misunderstanding: High mortality rate.

The tactics a group of players will use are bound to be different when "if someone dies we can just bop on down to the local temple" is replaced with "if someone dies they stay dead". The average kick-in-the-door tactics become unviable, replaced by a lot more recon, sneak-n-creep, parlay, bait-and-switch, ambush, and luring the enemy to the battle field of our choosing (and, depending on party alignment, assassination).

As such, the "intensity" I'm refering to is the excitement and anticipation felt when waiting to see if a plan worked, or if our intelligence was correct, or if the foe will fall for the ruse. There is also an increased intensity to the game when such conditions cannot be achieved and combat occurs when/where the foe has the advantage of terrain, numbers, and circumstance.

In the end, permanent fatality occurs about as often as it would with standard death-cure availability; it's simply the "mostly dead" experiences that are removed from the game. And that certainly doesn't reduce the quality of the game.

 

[Hjorimir]

First, I use the Death & Dying rules in Unearthed Arcana that makes it a bit easier to avoid death with a Fortitude save. I won't reprint them here, but if you have the book, they are worth a read.

Second, I removed all the raise dead spells from the game and created an incantation instead (as others have mentioned). Nobody has died so the use of the incantation has come into play as of yet (other than a TPK that left nobody around who would pursuit the incantation). There will be some surprises the first time.

 

[Inconsequenti-AL]

For insta-death spells, a nice house-rule I've seen is you don't die the moment you fail your save, but your hp drop at the negative amount by which you failed your save (ie if you fail your save by 4, you drop at -4 hp and are dying). If the character reaches -10, then the spell actually takes its effect (the character is disintegrated, or dead, etc.)

Wow! That's a really cool idea...

Simple and makes sense to me.

I think this is going to make an appearance in my campaign. Time for a chat with the players!

 

[Herpes Cineplex]

Ah! See, you've made an assumption that is undeniably bound to lead to misunderstanding: High mortality rate.

Well, no, I wasn't seriously assuming anything about your group or how y'all play your game. Again, that's kind of the whole point of making it clear that I'm just stating a personal opinion, only talking about our game, and very deliberately not speaking for anyone else.


But now that you've mentioned it, I think it's kind of interesting that you guys do more or less the same thing we do (namely, strive to keep the number of dead characters low) but apparently came at it from the other direction. We focused on the carrot of "we won't play high-mortality games" and consequently spend most of our time in systems and settings where combat is infrequent or almost exclusively sneaky (not toe-to-toe slugfests); so we didn't need to change anything about Raise Dead because we avoid playing games where we could abuse it. Whereas if I'm reading your post correctly (?), your group focused on the stick of "death is permanent, you need to use smart tactics to keep the mortality down" and ended up playing more or less the same kind of sneaky, no-frontal-assault game; so Raise Dead got changed in your game to make sure that abusing it couldn't be an issue?

--
sometimes it's funny how everything works out

 

[Savage Jim]

sometimes it's funny how everything works out

Very true!

[Aside]
That's the problem with my current posting status; I can only post from work, thus have to type/post quickly between umpteen zillion tasks that I'm supposed to be doing. Thus, sometimes a post doesn't contain the complete thought it is attempting to express.

That will be changing next month once the electricians finish re-wiring my apartment and our internet lines/jacks are working properly (like the lease says they should!!!).
[/Aside]

 

[Remathilis]

Hmm, Couple Options:

FAVORED: Some god (or gods) favors the PCs, allowing their souls to return. Other people (like Joe Farmer) aren't as favored and don't come back.

GIG: Similar vein: Epic Quests that must be fullfilled allow the Questers a chance at life after death that the common man doesn't.

BACK BEFORE DARK: There is a time-limit on raising the dead: A person so raised must either return to the realm of the dead for a short period of time (1 day a month, 1 month a year, etc) or perhaps has only 10 years available to him after his first death.

KARMA: PCs who do good deeds (saving kingdoms, slaying evil dragons, whatnot) aquire "karma" that allows them a second chance. Evil, Selfish and Cruel Acts reduce this karma (unless the PC is pledged to an evil deity, then its reversed). You could actually build a "karma" mechanic (akin to reputation) that tracks what spells can bring you back and what the penalties are for it.

BARGIN: You think the level loss is bad? You should see what else the God of Death wants in return for letting you go back!

HARVESTER: The God of the Dead Requires a Soul for EACH Month you remain on this mortal coil. Otherwise, he's coming back for yours. Now, if your killing Kobolds in the dungeons, this isn't a problem, but if your on a long boat ride to China, what do you do?

REFUGEE: Raise spells steal souls for the evil, angery, and bitter GotD. So, he usually sends minions (undead of proportional CR) to claim him back. They show up at the most in-oppertune times...

GHOSTWALK: Just a plug for a great WotC product that changes the nature of death. Not appropriate for all campaigns...

 

[cignus_pfaccari]

I rather like the idea that my character, who I've enjoyed playing and am emotionally invested in, can come back from the dead. I've never seen why people think it cheapens the game; you have to be dragged back to someone who can cast the spell, or have to carry the stuff around. Plus, really, dying sucks.

Whenever my character got raised, I tried to play him a bit differently. After all, he's been dead, what's to be worried about? He tended to be a bit cockier and take more risks in the next couple of adventures after being raised.

Brad