Why does epic level play entail treating death as a "speed bump"?

[tanj]

http://www.aintitcool.com/node/35776
http://www.aintitcool.com/node/35799
http://www.aintitcool.com/node/35811

The articles in question for those who couldn't find all three.

 

[lukelightning]

...even Achilles wasn't able to be "raised". No one was able to challenge Gilgamesh, but even he had to accept his own mortality. The heroes of WuXia frequently do stunts that most mortals can't even dream of, but they never come back from the dead.

Yes, but were these mighty heroes killed by bad luck with dice? No, they were killed by the story. There is a difference. If you remove raise dead then a string of unfortunate rolls could kill your character...then it's game over, make a new one. In which case you could to the Beerfest method of replacing your dead character with his twin brother... who wants to go by his brother's name out of respect.

And making raise dead difficult with all those epic quests down to the underworld, obtaining phoenix eggs, or whatever, just means one player has to sit out for a few sessions twiddling his thumbs while his friends go off on the "bring back the soul" adventure that is probably boring to them as well.

Of course, I never really saw raise dead as much of a problem, because my group seems to have a zillion and one character ideas floating around in our heads, so when a character dies we gleefully make a new one.

p.s. There are plenty of dead-and-returned heroes. Gandalf came back from the dead. King Arthur is supposedly still alive, ready to come back, and superheroes and supervillains are famous for not staying dead.

 

[WheresMyD20]

As others have said, treating death like a speedbump is a high-level D&D tradition. If characters are powerful enough to physically travel to the homes of the gods, then why shouldn't they be able to call a soul back and return it to its mortal body?

Epic characters may not fear death, but there are fates much worse than death lurking in the places where epic characters like to play.

 

[Wormwood]

Epic characters may not fear death, but there are fates much worse than death lurking in the places where epic characters like to play.

You mean like *shudder* losing your magic items?

Now that's a penalty with bite.

 

[lukelightning]

I'd much rather have a speedbump than something that derails the game.

(Edit: Wormwood beat me to it, but I want to keep my post here because I want to show off my use of the word "panoply")

Epic characters may not fear death, but there are fates much worse than death lurking in the places where epic characters like to play.

Thank the gods, though, that the "fate worse than death" will no longer be loss of equipment. 3e: "I'm not afraid to die, just make sure my panoply survives!"

 

[Darkwolf71]

Why does 4e treat death as a speedbump? Because WotC suspects that will appeal to their target audience, todays youth. And, they are probably right.

I know the 'it's a video game' mantra is seen as teh debil™, but think about it. Are there any video games anymore where you have only x number of chances and if you fail, that's it? Game Over. Start from the beginning again. I can't think of any off the top of my head. Absolute worst, in a CRPG you back up to your last save point and try again. MMOs, you simply respawn and try again. It's a fact of gaming culture, death just means you try harder next time, it rarely slows you down for any length of time.

So, that's why. D&D is, in fact becoming more like a video game in this and other respects. Is that a good thing? Remains to be seen. For the sake of the hobby and the trademark, I hope it is a gamble that pays off.

 

[Moon-Lancer]

*cough* Gandalf *cough*

plot/possible npc

besides, at least from the movie, Gandalf fell after slaying his foe. unless he as poisoned, how did he die after killing his foe in a d&d world? I say it was more of a level up then a death.

 

[Wormwood]

Why does 4e treat death as a speedbump? Because WotC suspects that will appeal to their target audience, todays youth. And, they are probably right.

Since the question is actually "Why does 4e still treat death like a speedbump?", then the answer would be, "to continue D&D's 30-year emulation of video games."

 

[DandD]

Well, it depends to the scene. If Aerith gets smashed by the Omega Weapon, she's only unconscious. But if Sephirot stabs her, she's really dead.
It just amounts to if you really want it to be permanent. If your character managed to advance into epic level adventures, people don't like losing their guys to some lousy rolls, and even if they do away with most of the save-or-die-effects in 4th edition, epic level play may still be pseudo-instant death in two rounds due to insanely high damage-output.
It's not like you're really using your own skills to avoid harm for your character, all you can do is throw a die, and you can hope that the GM rolls low with his own dice. There ain't no joypad to press the evade-button so that your pen-and-paper-avatar can dodge the mighty blow of the Thunder Demon-sultan Eunuch Guards.
At least, yet...

 

[Lacyon]

I know the 'it's a video game' mantra is seen as teh debil™, but think about it. Are there any video games anymore where you have only x number of chances and if you fail, that's it? Game Over. Start from the beginning again. I can't think of any off the top of my head.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/NintendoHard