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Message: <blockquote data-quote="jlhorner1974" data-source="post: 739913" data-attributes="member: 8628">Another way to think of it:Using a Vorpal weapon does work against a Hydra and will slice off its head, but that will not kill the creature.  So how can it be a death effect in this case?Vorpal just means it beheads the opponent.  It just so happens that most creatures die when losing their head.  For those that do not, Vorpal weapons are no big deal.I think of Vorpal as effectively doing a huge amount of damage.  If the creature is a type that would die if it lost its head and the attack roll is high enough to behead, then the creature takes enough damage to reduce its HP to -10 (or whatever is appropriate for your campaign).   Of course, the creature dies, but it is just like you hacked away in combat for a bunch of rounds, which clearly is not protected by death ward.Strictly speaking, this means only things with the [Death] descriptor are prevented by Death Ward, but there are probably some things not marked this way that should qualify because Wizards did not apply descriptors as diligently as they should have.  Since we have evidence that the descriptors are being cleaned up and new ones will be added in 3.5, I expect that this will be more clear in 3.5 -- you should just be able to see if the [Death] descriptor is listed.Things that would be prevented from death ward include: circle of death, destruction, finger of death, slay living, power word kill, the death ray of a catoblepas or beholder, a banshee's wail (or the spell of the same name), an assassin's death attack, or anything else with the [Death] descriptor.  Things not included are: death from hp or ability damage (e.g. poison or disease), drowning or suffocaiton, coup de grace, disintegration, petrification.In general, if it does not include the [Death] descriptor, you should assume it is not a death effect.  There are probably some cases that could be judgment calls though -- I would rule that a blow from a Nine Lives Stealer sword or use of a monk's Quivering Palm ability would qualify as a death effect, even though it does not specifically say so.And Kraedin is right, the new name for death spell is obviously circle of death -- it is almost identical to the 2E death spell in the way it works.  Even though this it isn't official, I think it's obvious what the designers meant.I agree with Quinn too.  You should not infer characteristics of a magical item based on the spells used to create it -- you should only look at the description itself.  When Monte created the DMG, he simply tried to pick spells that made sense for the items, and obviously there is no Decapitation spell, so he just picked something close.</blockquote>

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