I also don't mind save or die so much if the DM gives appropriate warnings to the creature. For example, when rolling a cockatrice on a random encounter table during a D&D basic game, I let the party see the lizard-chicken chase a rabbit out of the bushes and petrify it. The party still attacked the creature anyway (being PC's) but I didn't feel guilty about petrifying someone. I certainly didn't feel guilty about doing it the second time (after a few rounds of failing to petrify people because of saving throws).
If there is plenty of warning, or save or die monsters are infamous enough that they don't show up with suprise attacks (the great and terrible medusa lairs here, watch out!) then the mechanic is certainly easier to swallow.
Otherwise the game's expectations should be tempered so that the point of the game is to defeat a dungeon, not have a long term character arc or goals. Tomb of Horrors is not a dungeon that you put in the middle of a long-running plot heavy campaign (sorry Ari, but your Tomb of Horrors super adventure is fundamentally flawed in concept). I would much rather have save or die monsters be on a dial of lethality, with the monsters and spells that do this in a "tomb of horrors" module.
Barring that, I would at least like for those types of save or die abilities to be clearly marked as being disruptive to long-term plot heavy campaigns. A lot of DM's simply don't realize that they have to completely rewrite their campaigns when a few bad save or die rolls kill half the party.
If there is plenty of warning, or save or die monsters are infamous enough that they don't show up with suprise attacks (the great and terrible medusa lairs here, watch out!) then the mechanic is certainly easier to swallow.
Otherwise the game's expectations should be tempered so that the point of the game is to defeat a dungeon, not have a long term character arc or goals. Tomb of Horrors is not a dungeon that you put in the middle of a long-running plot heavy campaign (sorry Ari, but your Tomb of Horrors super adventure is fundamentally flawed in concept). I would much rather have save or die monsters be on a dial of lethality, with the monsters and spells that do this in a "tomb of horrors" module.
Barring that, I would at least like for those types of save or die abilities to be clearly marked as being disruptive to long-term plot heavy campaigns. A lot of DM's simply don't realize that they have to completely rewrite their campaigns when a few bad save or die rolls kill half the party.