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Message: <blockquote data-quote="CharlesRyan" data-source="post: 3623352" data-attributes="member: 5265">Count me among the people who dislike the "revolving door" of death in the standard D&D/d20 System rules. In addition to flavor problems (as Toben the Many described it: "Pet Cemetary weird," especially if you're really into the roleplaying aspect of the game), and the sense that death becomes just a speedbump in the adventurer's career, I think there are real gameplay problems with the RAW:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The "dying zone" (the range from 0 to -10) changes in scale over the course of 20 levels. It's a pretty wide zone when you're 1st level and taking damage in 3hp-5hp hits--but it's nearly meaningless when your 14th-level character is taking damage 30hp or 40hp at at shot.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">There's no allowance for a Boromir-style stand by a fatally wounded character. Sure, there's the very unlikely chance of landing right on 0 hp, but even then the character isn't really mortally wounded and the player generally doesn't yet feel his character is in danger (he still has 10 rounds to stabalize or be healed by his friends).</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Unconsciousness is too much of a player (and party) punishment. Getting knocked below 0 removes the player from the game, so instead of enjoying the tension and drama of what is probably a very tense, dramatic scene, the player is kicked out of play. Go watch TV while everyone else plays out the nail-biting climax.</li> </ul>I completely disagree with the idea that cheap-and-easy death (and equally cheap-and-easy ressurection) is necessary for player motivation and dramatic tension. If anything, D&D has devolved the dramatic role of death to a relatively meaningless annoyance, something that adds neither fun nor tension to the game.(My solution? Characters below 0hp are not unconscious, but they are both disabled and dying. That means they lose 1hp a round automatically, and lose another hp if they do anything but lay there. They don't die at -10 (there's no floor), but at the negative of level + 10 they must make a Fort save or die every time they take damage (which is every round at least, since they're dying). A dying character is highly motivated to just lie there, but if anyone wants to pull a Boromir, they have the option. Even a player who chooses to take no actions remains engaged in the game, because they still have the option of acting.)</blockquote>

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