Raise Dead Removes Sense of Danger

[Plane Sailing]

There are many d20 games now with no raising of the dead (star wars, CoC, Wheel of Time, Spywhatsit etc) and these are all still great fun to play.

personally, I dislike the way that raise dead gets used in "computer game" fashion; respawning heroes leap back to life. Just doesn't happen that way in any fantasy novels I ever read!

One of my house rules is that Raise Dead can *only* be cast within a hallowed temple on Holy Day of the week. This introduces the possibility of exciting chases to get to the appropriate temple at the appropriate time, and a sense of divine occasion about it. Resurrection and True Resurrection disappear from the spell lists in my world (although Miracle could be used to duplicate Raise Dead with no temple around - as could Wish).

Another alternative which you could introduce is that once the body is raised from the dead it must still convalesce for 2d6 days, remaining stabilised at 0 hp during that time.

Cheers

 

[DMFTodd]

There are many d20 games now with no raising of the dead (star wars, CoC, Wheel of Time, Spywhatsit etc) and these are all still great fun to play.

How do they handle death in those games? Is it still -10?

 

[Plane Sailing]

WoT and CoC still have death at -10.

SW d20 uses "wounds and vitality" system, where you have CON wound points, and when these reach 0 you must make a Fort ST or die instantly, otherwise you lie there dying, making another Fort ST every so often until you croak or are healed by someone.

I use a similar "last ditch Fort ST" in my game to reduce the rate of character death while maintaining the desired degree of tension.

 

[s/LaSH]

My campaign's an odd one... the ambient magic level is too low to allow for willy-nilly raise dead spells, and especially at lower levels the only way to get raised is to head to the Holy Land and seek out someone who's incredibly holy (ie. high level cleric living on a mountaintop somewhere).

The PCs have never been to the Holy Land.

Instead, when player death occurs (either by accident or DM intent), something really weird happens that is likely to restore the PC to life. There is always a twist; the source of the resurrection is always antagonistic in nature (or is it?).

The most important thing is: You always have a choice as to whether you return. It's spelled out in the PHB. And I did my darndest to make sure people were very, very conflicted as to whether they really want to return or not. One of them responded to the choice in a very verbose manner that he thought was refusing, but turned out to be accepting.

Gah, I can't say anything around here without spoiling future plots in my comic...