# Raise Dead: A nice big bone to the simulationists



## Stalker0 (Mar 18, 2008)

Raise Dead: Its one of those things that is always an issue for world builders. How does a society deal with a world in raising the dead is so easy? Kings that can just come back, high priests that cannot really be killed.

Everyone has their own reason, but those reasons are often hand waves on the "realism" of the world.

So I greatly applaud 4e's way to handle raise dead:

"You can only be raised if you have an unfulfilled destiny."

While PCs are often to have unfulfilled destines, most people simply cannot come back. It allows player to have raise dead, without making it a prominent influence on the world. A nice simple and elegant solution.


----------



## kinem (Mar 18, 2008)

Actually, as a pro-simulationist, I consider this yet another outrage.  What does "destiny" mean?  Why should the gods allow Harry the adventurer to be raised, only to see him fall into the next pit trap and die and be be left to rot, while the favored high priest has no 'destiny' and cannot be raised?


----------



## AntiStateQuixote (Mar 18, 2008)

Ooh!  Let me get in before the haters. 

I like it.  Simple, but straight-forward and nothing bars the DM from applying to "special" NPCs.


----------



## Imban (Mar 18, 2008)

Stalker0 said:
			
		

> Raise Dead: Its one of those things that is always an issue for world builders. How does a society deal with a world in raising the dead is so easy? Kings that can just come back, high priests that cannot really be killed.
> 
> Everyone has their own reason, but those reasons are often hand waves on the "realism" of the world.
> 
> ...




Hmm, I tentatively like this. As a sidenote, however, the ones that always had a more obvious impact on the world were Resurrection and True Resurrection, for me. The list of misadventure that kills you more dead than Raise Dead can fix is actually pretty large - simply vandalizing the corpse a bunch is enough to make sure someone you just assassinated need a Resurrection - so while wealthy people assumedly were buying Raise Dead for things like being gored by a boar, the ones who were chopped in half by our greatsword-wielding heroes needed more treatment than that.

Resurrection requires things like hiding / utterly destroying the body, or _disintegration_ and then scattering the dust to the four winds to make impossible, and that's frequently well beyond the means of normal assassins.

(Of course, True Resurrection fixes anything, but only people who are super have access to it, not just "wealthy people".)


----------



## Kraydak (Mar 18, 2008)

kinem said:
			
		

> Actually, as a pro-simulationist, I consider this yet another outrage.  What does "destiny" mean?  Why should the gods allow Harry the adventurer to be raised, only to see him fall into the next pit trap and die and be be left to rot, while the favored high priest has no 'destiny' and cannot be raised?




/agree.  As a simulationist I hate this change, and utterly fail to see how anyone could think it is, in any way, shape or form, pro-simulationism.  It is pure, rules-enshrined, DM fiat.


----------



## Irda Ranger (Mar 18, 2008)

Just to avoid any confusion: Link Relevant to News Post.

********

Hmm, does this mean that only 21st+ level characters (characters with an Epic Destiny) can be raised? I wouldn't think so.

I don't know. This seems weird to me. If I were writing a book / telling a story to someone, sure, this works. But within a cooperative world ...

I have to disagree with Stalker0's contention that this is a bone to simulationists. If I understand the term, I am one, and the simulationist in me is really balking at this. There is no fair way to "simulate" this within the context of the game. In fact, this seems like pure "gamism" to me - it's a game, the PCs are the players, so rules apply to them that don't apply generally.  To me, the heart of simulation is that nothing happens to PCs that can't happen (at least in theory) to NPCs.  They may use different "game rule models" to model the results/course of action for practical reasons, but the hypothetical "game physics" are universal.

From a simulationist context I never had a problem with _Raise Dead_.  It was rare enough (How many clerics are there that can even cast it in all of Eberron?) and expensive enough that it was only really available to PCs, other adventurers of note, and royalty - and not always even then, if you can't get to a priest in time or if the killer took certain precautions. I'm OK with that. 

Meh. This feels like a pretty heavy-handed "fix" to me. I'd rather they made _Raise Dead_ a Ritual but otherwise left it the way it was. They could even add in a few cool magical items like a "Death Bolt" (500 GP; One Use; this dark crossbow bolt, blessed by the Raven Queen's Priests, counts as a "Death Effect" if it delivers the killing blow.) for DMs to use when they want a "plot device death" to kill a King.



> As a sidenote, however, the ones that always had a more obvious impact on the world were Resurrection and True Resurrection, for me.



Me too. My "perfect world" is that Raise Dead is made into a Ritual, and otherwise stays just the way it is, but that True Resurrection is the spell limited to those of 21st level or higher who still have a Destiny to fulfill.  And the spell effect wears off once you reach 30th level.


----------



## robertliguori (Mar 18, 2008)

Let's wait until we see the rules for destiny.  If we see nonsense similar to the nonsense from Saga, then we can toss this into the continuing pile of DOA D&D rules across editions.

(Or, optionally, have religious ceremonies in which people ritually pledge to serve their god for some number of years and therefore have Unfinished Business if they die before their time.)

If destiny is simply something the DM assigns to characters arbitrarily ("Yeah, sorry, Bob, you have a destiny of Destruction, so you get a -2 to your attack rolls for 24 hours for resolving that border skirmish peacefully.") then this is beyond stupid.

Of course, even if you can't assign yourself a destiny, you can arrange to make it impossible to fulfill, and keep it eternally.  That would be interesting; a villain who swears an oath to dark powers to obliterate a family line, is granted the power of undeath until he succeeds, then turns around and says "Fooled you!" and protects the family line while working on his real agenda (and fighting off agents of the dark power).

Rules should be written with the assumption that people will try to break them.  If you trust people not to break the rules, then keep them vague and simply describe outcomes.  If you don't trust people, then the rules should either resist breakage, or break into awesome non-game-destroying pieces (like characters giving middle fingers to fate).


----------



## Jayouzts (Mar 18, 2008)

While I agree with the sentiment, I am not sure what this changes.  If most PC's and major villians have unfinished destinies, how is that different from what we have now?


----------



## small pumpkin man (Mar 18, 2008)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> /agree.  As a simulationist I hate this change, and utterly fail to see how anyone could think it is, in any way, shape or form, pro-simulationism.  It is pure, rules-enshrined, DM fiat.



It is, because simulationism means a *lot* of different things.

If, as is the more up to date bandwagon to be jumping on, we apply the Robin Laws player types, it's good for Storytellers (because it follows appropriate genre tropes) but likely bad for tacticians (since usage of "destiny" may or may not lack consistency). However both of these (genre tropes & consistent worlds) are under the simulationism banner, so GNS doesn't really mean much here.


----------



## eleran (Mar 18, 2008)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> /agree.  As a simulationist I hate this change, and utterly fail to see how anyone could think it is, in any way, shape or form, pro-simulationism.  It is pure, rules-enshrined, DM fiat.





How would a simulationist approach Raise Dead then?  I am anxious to see how Raise Dead works in the real world.


----------



## Sir Sebastian Hardin (Mar 18, 2008)

kinem said:
			
		

> Actually, as a pro-simulationist, I consider this yet another outrage.  What does "destiny" mean?  Why should the gods allow Harry the adventurer to be raised, only to see him fall into the next pit trap and die and be be left to rot, while the favored high priest has no 'destiny' and cannot be raised?




I am a sim guy. ANd I love this. Well some mayor NPCs might have important destinies too. You are the DM: YOU ARE DESTINY!


----------



## Wormwood (Mar 18, 2008)

Brent_Nall said:
			
		

> I like it.  Simple, but straight-forward and nothing bars the DM from applying to "special" NPCs.



Agreed.  Fantastic.


----------



## Wormwood (Mar 18, 2008)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> It is pure, rules-enshrined, DM fiat.



And for that, I am overflowing with gratitude.


----------



## Irda Ranger (Mar 18, 2008)

eleran said:
			
		

> How would a simulationist approach Raise Dead then?  I am anxious to see how Raise Dead works in the real world.



I've always assumed that "simulationist" means that you establish consistent rules within the game, and then let the world "emerge" in a complex way.  You don't dictate outcomes; you apply rules and simulate systems.

Really there's no wrong way to do Raise Dead then. You just accept that works "thusly", and apply that rule to the game.

But the catch, the real catch, is that rules must only be self-referential. They must apply to rules within the context of the game.  There can be a rule that says "Left-handed PCs get a +2 to Sleight of Hand checks." but there can't be a rule that says "Left-handed players get a +2 to Sleight of Hand checks."  The second rule refers to something that doesn't exist within the game.

That's the simulationists' problem with this new Raise Dead rule. It basically says that "Raise Dead works for world-people relevant to the current story arc, but not for anyone else."  That "doesn't work" because to a simulationist _everyone_ has their own story arc.  From within the game there shouldn't be any way to tell the difference between an NPC and a PC. Now there is.


----------



## Fallen Seraph (Mar 18, 2008)

I like it, it will actually work well with my homebrew setting.

Where certain individuals are considered "Reality-Deviants" where basically every step they take, slightly alters reality and every major event in their lives has a kind of butterfly effect.

Raise Dead can work into this, as that those who are Reality-Deviants can circumnavigate death (which is still bound to Reality) and return to life.

While the general populace can't, and since obviously major PCs and BBEGs would be amongst Reality-Deviants then works quite well 

___________________________________________________________________________________

As for general campaigns, it can work into simulation I think, since while they do talk about it being more PC-centered, that is simply because PCs generally have some kind of destiny or something greater ahead of them.

This doesn't mean only PCs and BBEG can be raised. You can have in your setting a benevolent ruler, who has been king of his empire for centuries; having been raised and kept alive by a clergy of priests, etc. 

Since perhaps he must lead his Kingdom to some future fate and thus must be kept alive, or what he is doing now with ruling his Kingdom will lead to the Destinies of others coming into being. Just imagine knowing your Destiny and the reason you were brought back was to create and bring about the Destiny of another, now to me that is really fun concept.

There are many ways this can work.


----------



## Wormwood (Mar 18, 2008)

eleran said:
			
		

> How would a simulationist approach Raise Dead then?



I suppose stuff like: it costs X amount of cash, the body must be in Y condition, Z ethical considerations must be adhered to, etc.


----------



## Kraydak (Mar 18, 2008)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> I've always assumed that "simulationist" means that you establish consistent rules within the game, and then let the world "emerge" in a complex way.  You don't dictate outcomes; you apply rules and simulate systems.
> 
> Really there's no wrong way to do Raise Dead then. You just accept that works "thusly", and apply that rule to the game.
> 
> ...




Irda Ranger succeeded at a english writing check I would have failed.


----------



## A'koss (Mar 18, 2008)

If you're going to keep Raise Dead, et. al. in the game, this is a very good way to handle it. 

Me happy.

We have heard though that you have to be at least Paragon-level in order to be raised (it sounds like Heroic tier characters who die, are done for good), and even though it is available, it's not supposed to be easy (which is good). However, we've also heard that at Epic Levels, some PCs have the ability to _self-resurrect_... which on the surface I'm not so keen on. Implementation matters though, so I look forward to seeing how this is resolved.


----------



## Sir Sebastian Hardin (Mar 18, 2008)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> From a simulationist context I never had a problem with _Raise Dead_.  It was rare enough (How many clerics are there that can even cast it in all of Eberron?) and expensive enough that it was only really available to PCs, other adventurers of note, and royalty.




Even if there only 10 guys that know Raise Dead (9+ level clerics), The Great Kindom of Galifar could have found at least one of them. 

And if the beloved king is killed...
"you raise the taxes, you sell stuff or even sell yourself but you get those 5000 gp within a week or you can say goodbye to your head! Got it?" 
so says the lovely, mourning Queen.


----------



## HeinorNY (Mar 18, 2008)

I'm a sim DM and I like it. It's perfect.

I also think that only souls that were powerful in life could ever be ressurected, so I hope the rules also support that.



			
				kinem said:
			
		

> What does "destiny" mean?



It depends on each one's personal philosophy, so I think the relevant question here is: Who decides each person's destiny? 
In game it's the Master of Fate AKA DM.


----------



## Hairfoot (Mar 18, 2008)

"Unfulfilled destiny" simply means that the player isn't ready for a PC to die.  Who's to say that a dead character's destiny wasn't to become lunch for a troll?


----------



## epochrpg (Mar 18, 2008)

Brent_Nall said:
			
		

> Ooh!  Let me get in before the haters.
> 
> I like it.  Simple, but straight-forward and nothing bars the DM from applying to "special" NPCs.




As a branded "Hater" I would just like to point out that I too LOVE this approach to raise dead.  Baker's point about why kings can't just have their wills stipulate that they be raised has always bugged me.  I have had to bend over backward in campaigns to deal with this before, claiming that the assassin used a special poison that prevented the body from being raised, etc.  All nobles had clauses in their will that said they had to be raised if they died unnaturally or the beneficiary would be disinherited, etc.  This is much better-- the King died because that WAS his destiny.  Brilliant.

However, DMs should then reserve the right to say that when a PC dies, that was THEIR destiny (i.e. in the triumphant battle vs. the Ultimate Evil, your hero dies just after striking a telling blow.  That should be your destiny that you fulfilled.  If a level 20 fighter gets cut down by orcs in this sleep... yeah, he may get a rez...)


----------



## Mirtek (Mar 18, 2008)

Wormwood said:
			
		

> And for that, I am overflowing with gratitude.



How is this any different from 3.x's DM fiat "he does not want to come back"?


----------



## Nightchilde-2 (Mar 18, 2008)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> To me, the heart of simulation is that nothing happens to PCs that can't happen (at least in theory) to NPCs.  They may use different "game rule models" to model the results/course of action for practical reasons, but the hypothetical "game physics" are universal.




I don't know for sure that this is what's being said.  I don't see it as inconceivable that various NPCs wouldn't have destinies that allow them to be raised.  After all, the recurring villain is an old (and effective) trope...


----------



## pukunui (Mar 18, 2008)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> Really there's no wrong way to do Raise Dead then.



Doesn't this statement contradict everything else you've said?



> You just accept that works "thusly", and apply that rule to the game.



So if I accept that only people with "unfinished destinies", something that I, as DM, am free to interpret as I see fit, can be raised from the dead and then apply that rule to my game, where's the problem?



> That's the simulationists' problem with this new Raise Dead rule. It basically says that "Raise Dead works for world-people relevant to the current story arc, but not for anyone else."



Where do you get the "relevant to the current story arc" bit? The way I read it, Raise Dead would work for anyone for whom the DM (aka "world-builder") thinks it should work, whether or not they are relevant to the current story arc. Sure, a DM could _choose_ to have Raise Dead only work for people relevant to the current story arc, but if he's got something going on in the background and it's feasible/believable/consistent with his game world to have some NPCs be brought back to life, there's nothing stopping him from doing it. I really don't see where it has to be relevant to what the PCs are doing. I just see that it's essentially up to the DM to decide who gets raised and who doesn't and it provides him with a convenient _in-game_ explanation as to why there aren't people being raised from the dead willy-nilly. It's also a convenient tool to explain why a particular PC does or does not come back from the dead (if the player wants to make a new character, then the DM can just say that the dead PC had clearly fulfilled his destiny or whatever).



> That "doesn't work" because to a simulationist _everyone_ has their own story arc.



Perhaps, but I would argue that 99% of those story arcs are not interesting enough to be worth actually simulating. Most of them would too closely resemble real life, and no one I know would be interested in having anything to do with them. They don't want to simulate their mostly boring real life experiences. They want to _escape_ them by playing heroes - extraordinary people who can do extraordinary things.



> From within the game there shouldn't be any way to tell the difference between an NPC and a PC.



I disagree. There _should_ be a way to distinguish PCs from NPCs. PCs are the heroes. They're the protagonists (or, in some cases, the antagonists). This is not something that's new to 4e. 3e had it too, in so far as there were NPC classes which were less mechanically powerful than PC classes and so on.


----------



## Majoru Oakheart (Mar 18, 2008)

Hairfoot said:
			
		

> "Unfulfilled destiny" simply means that the player isn't ready for a PC to die.  Who's to say that a dead character's destiny wasn't to become lunch for a troll?



Yeah, as other people have said, it codifies the problems that you normally face as a DM into rules.

As a DM, my problem with raise dead has always been "Why do the PCs get it every time they die but I have to come up with (lame) excuses if I don't want all of their enemies coming back to life every time they defeat them or the King to stay dead after an assassination?"

This basically gives you a rule that answers that question.  It's fairly cheap to bring people back to life with this ritual.  Anyone with a bit of money and access to someone who can cast it can get someone back to life.  It just only works on people who NEED to come back to life because they weren't SUPPOSED to die.  You know, like PCs who died in a random encounter and want to continue playing their characters.


----------



## robertliguori (Mar 18, 2008)

ainatan said:
			
		

> I'm a sim DM and I like it. It's perfect.
> 
> I also think that only souls that were powerful in life could ever be ressurected, so I hope the rules also support that.
> 
> ...




But the DM isn't master of fate.  The proper term for the master of fate is "Author".  DM implies dice and player free will.  As long as you use either, _there is no such thing as preordained fate_.

This brings you to the uncomfortable situation of either ignoring the dice and the players or having the players be the only characters in the universe that override destiny.

Destiny, as an uncaring force in the universe moving characters towards a certain outcome, can work.  The trick is to make destiny like gravity; it exerts a force, but with power or cleverness, you can laugh as it utterly fails to influence you.

That being said, this rule does make me want to play 4E, as a character that combines Deadpool with Belkar Bitterleaf.


----------



## ThirdWizard (Mar 18, 2008)

Every decision doesn't have to be a G vs. S vs. N one...


----------



## Imban (Mar 18, 2008)

See, there's somewhat of a tension between two of the ways that D&D can really play out. One is like Eberron, the other is like the Forgotten Realms played as epic-level fantasy rather than LotR Ripoff fantasy. In the former, resurrections going on all the time throws things for a loop, and assuming we want them for gameplay reasons, a handwave that basically says "only the PCs and rare people on the plot railroad can be resurrected" is fine. If it's not, you basically just have to throw resurrections out entirely.

In the latter, kings of countries worth mentioning don't just get normally assassinated by normal things like a knife to the face. They get immolated by black flames that turn them into bodaks, then spirited away, so they can't be resurrected as they "live" on as undead, but no one knows where. Otherwise, the level-22 high priest of their country just resurrects them, and this is *still* a fine course of events, because we're playing in wacky super powered fantasy land. Under this system, you can put heavier restrictions on resurrection - perhaps raising the level at which it's available and its requirements - so that only exceedingly important and powerful people will be returning from corpseville, not every minor noble who gets gored by a boar, but "You hear some jerk stabbed the king to death last week? No? Oh, no, no, he's fine, the High Priest of Pelor raised him the next day." is a 100% fine tavern discussion in this style of play.


----------



## HeinorNY (Mar 18, 2008)

robertliguori said:
			
		

> Destiny, as an uncaring force in the universe moving characters towards a certain outcome, can work.



The DM controls that force in my games.


----------



## Stalker0 (Mar 18, 2008)

Mirtek said:
			
		

> How is this any different from 3.x's DM fiat "he does not want to come back"?




Because it provides something that 4e haters have been saying the system provides little of....good flavor for the mechanics.

Heroes come back because they are heroes, because they gods have decreed they have unfinished work to do. Most people are simply dead. If a dm doesn't want raise in his game, he simply says the pcs don't have that unfinished destiny.


----------



## robertliguori (Mar 18, 2008)

ainatan said:
			
		

> The DM controls that force in my games.




Well, yes.  The DM can control every force in the game.  Declaring that will-of-the-DM destiny can randomly trump any of them means you're no longer actually playing a game with meaningful rules, and not declaring so means that destiny can be casually overridden by unanticipated outcomes.  So, since you run destiny as a blind force, if a character chooses to take an action that voids destiny, what happens?


----------



## HeinorNY (Mar 18, 2008)

robertliguori said:
			
		

> So, since you run destiny as a blind force, if a character chooses to take an action that voids destiny, what happens?



Give me an example to toy with.


----------



## Irda Ranger (Mar 18, 2008)

Wormwood said:
			
		

> And for that, I am overflowing with gratitude.



Eh. This is DM fiat I don't need or want. I realize that I'm expressing a person bias, but some things (like "beat AC to hit NPC with sword") should be clear, consistent and fiat-free.  I think that spells oft used _by PCs_ should be in that category.

Consider example #1:
You're character is Bob, he's a Cleric. He can cast Raise Dead. One week your adventuring companion Mirt the Stinky dies. You don't like him much (particularly how he smells), but out of fellowship and duty you case Raise Dead. Because "he has a Destiny", it works. The next week a band of orc raiders sweeps through your home town and (mercifully) kill Bob's sister. You rush home to "save" her, but your spell fizzles. You cast it exactly the same as last week, but she just doesn't "have a destiny." Too bad.

This, to my mind, is a bad result. The PC should either be able to raise the dead or he can't. I guess I'd be fine with it either way, but this "only if the DM feels like it" rule just doesn't work for me.

Now consider example #2:
Your character is Bob. It doesn't matter what class he is. What matters is that he has spent the last two years (in campaign) tracking down the sorcerer that killed his family. He tracks him down to his lair and kills him.

Too bad! That NPC has a Destiny! No matter how many times you kill him, Clerics of the Raven Queen can just keep bringing him back.

********

Both of those examples may be examples of "Bad DM-ing", and to an extent the rules can never protect you from that. But encouraging it in this manner isn't good either (IMO).


----------



## Nahat Anoj (Mar 18, 2008)

As I understand it (from various GNS arguments in days of yore), the term "simulationist" can involve simulating the physics of a genre in addition to simulating the physics of the real world.  So by saying Raise Dead only works for people with unfulfilled destinies, we have established an element of the D&D genre.  The mechanics, then, are such that they simulate this genre element.  So therefore it's simulationist.


----------



## Wolfspider (Mar 18, 2008)

Interesting.

But how does this change the use of raise dead in a practical sense?


----------



## Derren (Mar 18, 2008)

I just repeat what Kraydak said.
"Rules enshrined DM-Fiat of the worst sort" (the last part was added by me).


----------



## pukunui (Mar 18, 2008)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> Eh. This is DM fiat I don't need or want. I realize that I'm expressing a person bias, but some things (like "beat AC to hit NPC with sword") should be clear, consistent and fiat-free.  I think that spells oft used _by PCs_ should be in that category.
> 
> Consider example #1:
> You're character is Bob, he's a Cleric. He can cast Raise Dead. One week your adventuring companion Mirt the Stinky dies. You don't like him much (particularly how he smells), but out of fellowship and duty you case Raise Dead. Because "he has a Destiny", it works. The next week a band of orc raiders sweeps through your home town and (mercifully) kill Bob's sister. You rush home to "save" her, but your spell fizzles. You cast it exactly the same as last week, but she just doesn't "have a destiny." Too bad.
> ...



Bad DMing or not, neither of your examples is impossible under the 3.5 Raise Dead rules either ...

Example #1: PC cleric casts raise dead on NPC ally. DM, possibly arbitrarily (and possibly even out of spite considering that the PCs/players don't seem to like the NPC much), decides that the spell works because the NPC "wants to come back". The PC then tries this later on the NPC's sister but the spell doesn't work because the DM has, again possibly arbitrarily, decided that she _doesn't_ want to come back.

Example #2: PC hunts down BBEG killer of family and slays him. His evil cleric cronies raise him. PC kills him again. Evil cleric cronies raise him again. _Ad infinitum_. _Ad nauseum_.



> Both of those examples may be examples of "Bad DM-ing", and to an extent the rules can never protect you from that. But encouraging it in this manner isn't good either (IMO).



Keep in mind that we're arguing on the basis of what a freelancer has told us about how he finds the new rules to work for him. We don't actually have the rules text itself so we can't really know what sort of meta-behavior it encourages.


----------



## Irda Ranger (Mar 18, 2008)

pukunui said:
			
		

> Doesn't this statement contradict everything else you've said?



No. Read it closer.


----------



## Wormwood (Mar 18, 2008)

Wolfspider said:
			
		

> Interesting.
> 
> But how does this change the use of raise dead in a practical sense?



Mechanically? Not much. Maybe it's cheaper?

However, the Fluff is vastly improved. 

As for DM fiat, nothing really changes except I no longer have to come up with a BS reason why _raise dead_ isn't as common as liposuction.


----------



## pukunui (Mar 18, 2008)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> No. Read it closer.



 You say there's no wrong way to do raise dead and then go on to outline how you think this new way is, essentially, the wrong way to do it. How is that not contradicting yourself?


----------



## Plane Sailing (Mar 18, 2008)

kinem said:
			
		

> Actually, as a pro-simulationist, I consider this yet another outrage.  What does "destiny" mean?  Why should the gods allow Harry the adventurer to be raised, only to see him fall into the next pit trap and die and be be left to rot, while the favored high priest has no 'destiny' and cannot be raised?




In contrast, it meets my simulationist goals nicely. The standard 3e rules (raise dead is available if you've got enough money and want to come back) makes world simulation somewhat difficult in that you've got to account for relatively easy raising of the dead in society.

If 4e rules state that only those with unfulfilled destiny can be raised (however that may be defined) it removes the whole 'campaign world with raise dead' problem at a stroke.

Cheers


----------



## robertliguori (Mar 18, 2008)

ainatan said:
			
		

> Give me an example to toy with.



OK.  Character has the destiny of slaying a great evil in single combat.  Evil slips and falls in a 200' spiked death pit.

Character has destiny of slaying great evil.  Character leaves continent and refuses to engage in any actions that directly engage evil.

Character has destiny of preserving X.  Character destroys X.

Character has a destiny of preserving X.  Other character destroys X.

Character has destiny of preserving X.  Character locks away X in such a way that it is under a controlled hazard, always in peril but never actually destroyed, and adventures freely.

Character has a destiny that requires X to not be destroyed.  Character subjects X to stress, trusting in destiny to make sure that X never actually becomes irrecoverable.



			
				Jonathan Moyer said:
			
		

> As I understand it (from various GNS arguments in days of yore), the term "simulationist" can involve simulating the physics of a genre in addition to simulating the physics of the real world.  So by saying Raise Dead only works for people with unfulfilled destinies, we have established an element of the D&D genre.  The mechanics, then, are such that they simulate this genre element.  So therefore it's simulationist.



Destiny as a force in the world is not the problem.  Destiny as handwaving, that doesn't have characters engaging in elaborate schemes to make the rules of destiny work in their favor, or optionally simply murdering the in-game personality in charge of destiny, is the problem.

Incidentally, 'simulationist' in this context carries along with it the unattached rider "...of a fantasy universe of high adventure, etc."  One can describe tic-tac-toe as a simulationist game, where the universe being simulated is a 3x3 grid in which Xs and Os are placed.  This does make what people actually mean when they use the worlds 'simulationist' or 'narrativist' any less meaningful.


----------



## Kzach (Mar 18, 2008)

kinem said:
			
		

> Actually, as a pro-simulationist, I consider this yet another outrage.  What does "destiny" mean?  Why should the gods allow Harry the adventurer to be raised, only to see him fall into the next pit trap and die and be be left to rot, while the favored high priest has no 'destiny' and cannot be raised?



Gods work in mysterious ways.


			
				Kraydak said:
			
		

> /agree.  As a simulationist I hate this change, and utterly fail to see how anyone could think it is, in any way, shape or form, pro-simulationism.  It is pure, rules-enshrined, DM fiat.



Then DM un-fiat it. Why is this such a difficult concept for people to grasp? Naysayers are always acting like everybody must obey the rules as if they're some divine commandment.


			
				eleran said:
			
		

> How would a simulationist approach Raise Dead then?  I am anxious to see how Raise Dead works in the real world.



Ooh, well said!


----------



## Wolfspider (Mar 19, 2008)

As with so many of the so-called problems with v3.5, I've run into none of the supposed difficulties with raise dead in my games.  Not every stableboy or barmaid who gets run through is automatically raised at the temple turnstile.

I do like this idea, though.  I think I will implement it in my v3.5 game, even though something like it already exists in practice--only heroes (or villians) get raised, those who do have a destiny.


----------



## Hairfoot (Mar 19, 2008)

Plane Sailing said:
			
		

> If 4e rules state that only those with unfulfilled destiny can be raised (however that may be defined) it removes the whole 'campaign world with raise dead' problem at a stroke.



I've never considered that a problem.  Only the highest-level priests can cast it, so very few NPCs will even have access to it.  Also, you'd imagine clerics tend to be quite strict about who they raise and under what circumstances, so unless the party can find a priest of a commerce/trade god of high enough level to raise dead, it's still a rare and special event.  IME, anyway.


----------



## Fallen Seraph (Mar 19, 2008)

I have always viewed Destiny as something that is in flux, it is that little thing that is always one-step ahead of you.

Destiny is the only true omnipresence in D&D. It is something that sees everything you will do, may do, and when. It sees what your true Destiny is, us as people may believe our Destiny lays in for your example slaying the great evil. But it truly wasn't it could be...

-The journey to do so leads you to impact the lives of those around you, sending them to do great things.

-You discover something in your journey to defeat the great evil that alters the world.

-After the death of the great evil, circumstances change and sets in motion your true destiny.

Those are just a couple examples.

Now that is not to say Destiny cannot be tricked, it is just extremely difficult. Some Gods may be able to do so, some Epic-level characters may be able to do, "once per day when you die..." could be you tricking Destiny into this not being your time-to-die, etc.

Hell, I have always viewed the Star-Pact as being tied to Fate and Destiny, so perhaps you could make a deal with the Fates to alter your Destiny, etc.


----------



## Irda Ranger (Mar 19, 2008)

Sir Sebastian Hardin said:
			
		

> And if the beloved king is killed...
> "you raise the taxes, you sell stuff or even sell yourself but you get those 5000 gp within a week or you can say goodbye to your head! Got it?"
> so says the lovely, mourning Queen.



Yes; and?

If you don't like the world that the rule creates, change the rule. But change it in a way that allows PCs to have control over their own spells. You don't leave the diameter of _Fireball _to DM fiat, do you?




			
				pukunui said:
			
		

> Bad DMing or not, neither of your examples is impossible under the 3.5 Raise Dead rules either, so I don't really see what you're getting at.



Here's the link to the SRD: LINK   Apparently you need to go read it again. Either that or read my example #1 again. Assuming that Bob's sister wants to come back (and why wouldn't she?), example #1 is impossible under 3.5.

Admittedly, example #2 may or may not be possible under 4E. We don't know yet what restrictions Raise Dead works under (does disintegrating his head still work?). But it is impossible under 3.5 if you "kill him right." However, I could have made a better example than #2 if I'd spent more than a minute on it. Whatever. See below.




			
				robertliguori said:
			
		

> But the DM isn't master of fate. The proper term for the master of fate is "Author". DM implies dice and player free will ... Declaring that will-of-the-DM destiny can randomly trump any of them means you're no longer actually playing a game with meaningful rules, and not declaring so means that destiny can be casually overridden by unanticipated outcomes.



_Note that I merged two of Robert's posts. I also added the orange coloring to hi-light the key bit (IMO). - IR_

This is the part that really bothers me. This rule gives the DM the power to "tell the PCs story for him." It takes away control from the PCs in a ham-fisted manner that is blatantly "because the DM feels like it." It reinforces that the campaign is the DM's opportunity to tell storied *to *me, rather than for me to be a meaningful participant in an emergent story.

Maybe that works for some people. Maybe, as a DM, you insist on having 100% narrative control (and the PCs better not mess it up by Raising people who don't have a Destiny!), or maybe as a PC you like just sitting back and listening to a good yarn. But it doesn't work for me, either as a DM or a PC.

*********

Just to make clear though, I'm not "really upset about this." This isn't some "4E is dead to me!" moment, or something else equally hyperbolic / over-dramatic. In the scheme of things, house ruling this is a 5-second job. Easy peasy. I think 4E is really moving in the right direction in a number of ways, and this is but one small dislike easily fixed.


----------



## HeinorNY (Mar 19, 2008)

robertliguori said:
			
		

> OK.  Character has the destiny of slaying a great evil in single combat.  Evil slips and falls in a 200' spiked death pit.
> 
> Character has destiny of slaying great evil.  Character leaves continent and refuses to engage in any actions that directly engage evil.
> 
> ...



Two options:
-He can't meet his destiny anymore
-It wasn't really part of his destiny


----------



## DandD (Mar 19, 2008)

Meh, Raise Dead and other Ressurection spells have always been something dumb in D&D. No matter what explanation they give and whatever rules specification they write, it will be dumb, no matter what. 
Voyaging to the Realms of Dead People and bringing back the souls in Orpheus-style should be the only viable way for heroes and other good people. Everything else should just be Blackest Magic born from the hearts of evil people who read the Necronomicon and other vile books of Darkness and Dread. Raise Dead and Ressurection should be Necromantic Spells that make the Ressurected become evil and spiteful at best, and Zombies who crave brains otherwise.


----------



## Nahat Anoj (Mar 19, 2008)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> Hmm, does this mean that only 21st+ level characters (characters with an Epic Destiny) can be raised? I wouldn't think so.



I remember reading somewhere that coming back from the dead depended on Tier.  At the Heroic Tier, death is incredibly costly, if not impossible, to come back from.  At the Paragon Tier, coming back from the dead is easier but it will still require a good amount of resources.  At the Epic Tier, death is easy to come back from.


----------



## DSRilk (Mar 19, 2008)

> > Quote:
> > Originally Posted by Kraydak
> > /agree. As a simulationist I hate this change, and utterly fail to see how anyone could think it is, in any way, shape or form, pro-simulationism. It is pure, rules-enshrined, DM fiat.
> 
> ...




I wouldn't approach raise dead, and haven't for over a decade.  I thoroughly dislike the idea.  Basically, the problem is the game system is designed like a board game where pieces can be eliminated while at the same time assigning each player the job of only one piece on the board.  Thus either the game ends for that player when his piece is eliminated or you have to find some way to bring him back.  The game system uses raise dead and its ilk for this purpose.  Dead?  No problem, find a priest, bring some coin, and you're back up and running.  This new fluff doesn't make any difference at all, imo.  Only the VERY rich could afford it before, and even in previous rules it stated that some people didn't wish to come back, so it was commonly always PCs alone that usually got rez'd.  The problem for me has always been that ANYONE died and came back.  To me, the resurrection of ANYONE is a world altering event.

To address the issue of piece elimination in my game, you simply can't die unless you tell me your character wants to risk his life for the task.  Instead, there are far more insidious and interesting things that happen when you hit -10 hp (or whatever marker we happened to be using that campaign).  This method eliminates the problem without the weirdness of any kind of resurrection.  There are many good threads on this type of approach, so I'll speak on it no further here.

Given all this, I suspect that I'll handle raise dead the exact same way this version.  That said, the idea of rituals appeals to me.  Rituals, as I understand them, might be a place where resurrection makes sense in my concept of the world.  Bad guy conjuring some horrible ritual in order to bring back a dead god, ancient evil, or his long dead master.  In short, it's a plot device, not a way to fix a game issue.


----------



## Falling Icicle (Mar 19, 2008)

I really don't think this changes anything. Players will still be able to treat death as a mere inconvenience, and the DM's favorite bad guys will always come back, to the players' immense frustration. The only thing this does is prevent you from wasting money raising some commoner back to life, as if anyone actually did that before.


----------



## Fallen Seraph (Mar 19, 2008)

Hmm... That could actually mean, that the Destiny to befowl you is loose and only when you begin to step into that Destiny that Destiny begins to become a presence in your life.

Sorta the idea, that one has the opportunity to step into one's Destiny either knowingly or unknowingly or mis-step and become simply a normal adventurer.


----------



## pukunui (Mar 19, 2008)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> Here's the link to the SRD: LINK   Apparently you need to go read it again. Either that or read my example #1 again. Assuming that Bob's sister wants to come back (and why wouldn't she?), example #1 is impossible under 3.5.
> 
> Admittedly, example #2 may or may not be possible under 4E. We don't know yet what restrictions Raise Dead works under (does disintegrating his head still work?). But it is impossible under 3.5 if you "kill him right." However, I could have made a better example than #2 if I'd spent more than a minute on it. Whatever. See below.



I'm not really seeing how #1 is impossible under the 3.5 rules ... but I'll admit that I haven't really been arguing with you properly. I've been thinking in terms of "raising people from the dead" in general terms, not in the specific terms of the 3.5 _raise dead_ spell (that is to say, I've been thinking in terms that encompass _resurrection_ and _true resurrection_ as well as _raise dead_). So in general terms, your examples are not impossible with the 3.5 mechanics. In specific terms, they might be impossible with the specific 3.5 _raise dead_ mechanics (although I'm still not seeing it) but since we don't know the specific terms for the 4e mechanics, everything is mere conjecture. Again, as I said before, this entire thread is based off what is essentially a playtester's opinion of how bringing people back from the dead works in 4e. We don't even really know if Keith was referring specifically to a 4e ritual called _raise dead_ or whether he was just referring to the overall method of bringing people back from the dead, whether or not there are multiple ways of doing it.



> This is the part that really bothers me. This rule gives the DM the power to "tell the PCs story for him." It takes away control from the PCs in a ham-fisted manner that is blatantly "because the DM feels like it." It reinforces that the campaign is the DM's opportunity to tell storied *to *me, rather than for me to be a meaningful participant in an emergent story.



It gives a _bad_ DM the power to do this (but then, as I've tried to point out already, bad DMs could already do these sorts of things with the 3.5 rules). It gives a _good_ DM the power to say that powerful NPCs in his campaign world die and stay dead because coming back from the dead isn't just about knowing the right people and having enough money. It also gives a good DM the power to say that a PC has returned from the dead for "story" reasons (no doubt worked out in conjunction with the player concerned) so that the player can keep playing that PC -- whereas, if the player _didn't_ want to keep playing that PC but the other players felt it was in keeping with their characters to try to raise that PC anyway, the DM could then say that the spell doesn't work because clearly that PC's time has finished rather than having to say "He doesn't want to come back", which, if you ask me, would be a totally BS answer in 99% of the cases where this situation might arise ... because what hero, given the opportunity to come back to life and continue the fight, would say, "No thanks. I like it here. I'll let you guys sort it out." To have him say that simply because the PC's player isn't interested in playing that character anymore is purely metagaming (and I've actually had this happen in a 3.5 campaign). The new fluff at least gives the DM a plausible in-game reason for why the character isn't coming back -- that is to say, he _can't_ come back as opposed to he simply doesn't want to ...


----------



## small pumpkin man (Mar 19, 2008)

Wolfspider said:
			
		

> Interesting.
> 
> But how does this change the use of raise dead in a practical sense?



It doesn't. All it does is change he base assumption from "anybody can get raised unless there's a good reason not to" to "no-one can get raised unless there's a good reason they can".

Depending on your definition of "good reason", this could make no difference at all.


----------



## Nahat Anoj (Mar 19, 2008)

Stalker0 said:
			
		

> While PCs are often to have unfulfilled destines, most people simply cannot come back. It allows player to have raise dead, without making it a prominent influence on the world. A nice simple and elegant solution.



I've often been annoyed with raising people from the dead and I, too, am pleased by this change.  It's not such a big deal, as I've simply banned resurrection magic from my games (oh, the wailing and gnashing of teeth that causes).  If only people with destinies to fulfill can be raised, that's good enough for me and I will probably allow resurrection magic finally.

It also makes the Raven Queen (the goddess in charge of destiny and death) truly the epitome of Lawful Neutrality - as long as they have destinies to fulfill she allows *anyone* to come back, goodhearted saint or blackhearted murderer.


----------



## Valdrax (Mar 19, 2008)

kinem said:
			
		

> Actually, as a pro-simulationist, I consider this yet another outrage.  What does "destiny" mean?  Why should the gods allow Harry the adventurer to be raised, only to see him fall into the next pit trap and die and be be left to rot, while the favored high priest has no 'destiny' and cannot be raised?



1)  Maybe that was Harry's destiny.  Fate works in mysterious ways.
2)  Maybe that was the high priest's destiny.  Rain falls on the just and the unjust alike.
3)  Maybe the gods aren't in control of fate.  Maybe it's the furies.  Maybe even the gods have destinies to fulfill in time.



			
				Mirtek said:
			
		

> How is this any different from 3.x's DM fiat "he does not want to come back"?



Because good guys should rarely want to come back, and evil/neutral guys probably always should.  Why do heroes come back and villains stay dead, given the rewards awaiting them in 3e's after life?  Instead, this rule ensures that our heroes and our villains stay on the stage until their story is done without contravening the logic of the setting.



			
				robertliguori said:
			
		

> So, since you run destiny as a blind force, if a character chooses to take an action that voids destiny, what happens?



Your mistake is assuming that destiny is preordained by the DM in such a manner that the players can void it.  Destiny exists entirely as a force *within the campaign world,* and not *in the real world.*  Destiny is what your group says it is by their actions.  It is largely revealed after the fact.

You don't have to issue ironclad prophecies in the game for a character to have a destiny.  Destiny is largely just protagonist aura anyway, even in stories written and told entirely by a single person.


----------



## robertliguori (Mar 19, 2008)

Kzach said:
			
		

> Gods work in mysterious ways.



Gods are NPCs.  You can hunt them down, beat them up, and intimidate them into telling you the truth.  Good luck that whole enshrining the mechanics of the universe on the man behind the curtain.




			
				Kzach said:
			
		

> Then DM un-fiat it. Why is this such a difficult concept for people to grasp? Naysayers are always acting like everybody must obey the rules as if they're some divine commandment.



*sigh* Because we, as you might notice, are discussing D&D.  We are not discussing Robert's Homebrew of D&D.  The RAW is the common ground we share and generally take for granted when discussing a system.  Moreover, the mere fact that there is such discussion on the topic shows that unlike Death Doesn't Inhibit Actions or Cleave + Bag of Rats, there is no clear consensus on particular applications of this rule being bad and wrong.



> Ooh, well said!



Allow me to educate you.
Realism is a measure of how something measures up to reality.
Verisimilitude is a measure of how something measures up to expectations of a given reality, not necessarily the actual one.  A generally-shared expectation is that abilities based on skill and talent don't run out the way abilities based on resources that need to be renewed do.  If the idea of learning how to trip someone in combat, doing so, then being unable to do so later on until a specific period of time has passed, then being able to do so again until you actually do with no confounding factors like fatigue or relative capacity of your opponent does not strike you as a poor simulation of skill-based abilities, that is fine.  But if it does, then rules that make skill-based tripping work a set number of times in a given time period are not verisimilistic.  Add a general expectation that skill is actually chi manipulation and not really a measure of knowing how to do something, and it's verisimilistic again.

Likewise, make the rules the universe is trying to simulate "Whatever the DM wants to happen happens, regardless of past experience.", and you have achieved perfect verisimilitude; it's just that playing in such a universe is of little interest for many of us.  For me, the funnest part of D&D is adding individual bits of awesome to the world and watching them interact and fight it out.  I think that the ability of a ruleset to lead to interesting places not anticipated by the original designer to be a feature, not a bug, and I think that if you're going to permit resurrection but disallow it under certain circumstances for plot reasons, you should time out, explain you are altering the rules of the universe to allow / disallow resurrection in this instance, and run with it.



			
				ainatan said:
			
		

> Two options:
> -He can't meet his destiny anymore
> -It wasn't really part of his destiny



In the first option, it seems that if the old age restriction got removed (which I imagine it would, since it was a simulationist-emergent rule* and 4E doesn't like those), then it seems that snagging and subverting a destiny should be the first thing you do upon hitting paragon level.

The second case obviously doesn't apply, since the destinies were all specifically stated.  I was also working from the SWSE destinies, which can be clearly identified in-universe from the way the world bends around specific, enumerated goals.

*I used to be severely annoyed about the die-of-old-age-inherently rules.  Why was it necessary to enforce such lifespans?
Then I read the old write-ups of the FR NPCs and realized that the old age rules were a way of permanently separating Elminister and his ilk of been-everywhere, done-everything, you'll-never-be-as-good-as-I-am-ever NPCs from the continuity of RAW.

Plus, it's another reason to shoot for lichdom, and any rule that adds more liches to a campaign setting is a good one. 



> Meh, Raise Dead and other Ressurection spells have always been something dumb in D&D. No matter what explanation they give and whatever rules specification they write, it will be dumb, no matter what.
> Voyaging to the Realms of Dead People and bringing back the souls in Orpheus-style should be the only viable way for heroes and other good people. Everything else should just be Blackest Magic born from the hearts of evil people who read the Necronomicon and other vile books of Darkness and Dread. Raise Dead and Ressurection should be Necromantic Spells that make the Ressurected become evil and spiteful at best, and Zombies who crave brains otherwise.



I disagree.  I actually agree with the 4E tiers.
At Heroic tier, you follow the rules of the world.  Ressurection is serious, scary stuffs, beyond your ken.

At Paragon tier, you can bend around the rules slightly.  You can journey to the underworld, and make a bargain with Hades, and hey, that's a 43 on your Perform check, so you have his approval...under these conditions.

At Epic tier?
"...he punched out Charon, seduced the shades of thirty different women, swam the Styx while carrying three amphora of wine, drank the wine, sought out Eurystheus's father and murdered him _again_, shattered Sisyphus's boulder with the explanation 'Yeah, Dad can be a real dick sometimes.', and then _stole my dog?_ On a _dare_?"


----------



## Plane Sailing (Mar 19, 2008)

Hairfoot said:
			
		

> I've never considered that a problem.  Only the highest-level priests can cast it, so very few NPCs will even have access to it.




But if you look at the DMG demographics....

Any large town (2001+ people) has a chance of a 9th level cleric who can raise dead (4th-9th)

Each small city (5001+ people) is pretty likely to have a 9th level cleric (7th-12th)

Each large city (12,001+ people) is guaranteed to have three clerics of 10-15th level

Each metropolis (25,001+ people) is guaranteed to have four clerics of 13-18th level

so if playing straight by the book, wealthy PCs would be unlikely to fail to find a cleric capable of casting the spell unless there were some campaign-specific restriction or deviation from the baseline (e.g. Eberron where most of the high level people died in the war).

Personally I prefer campaigns were there isn't such a high assumed baseline of high level characters; I'm more Eberron than Forgotten Realms in terms of my preferences 

Cheers


----------



## Nahat Anoj (Mar 19, 2008)

All this talk about destiny has got me jonesing for an Al-Qadim 4e game ... which is set in Zakhara, the Land of Fate, of course.     The Loregiver strikes me as a priestess of the Raven Queen, incidentally (naturally, the RQ will have a different name in the AQ setting).


----------



## Njall (Mar 19, 2008)

Love the change.
I've always wondered why, say, a good deity should grant a cleric the power to resurrect an evil companion, just because he's a friend of him.
And the fact that the average mid level adventurer died and was resurrected a couple of times per week was something I always hated. It made death less...special, if you get what I mean.

Is it DM fiat? Yes. However, so were some uses of Miracle and Wish: you could get what you asked for, or you couldn't.
Now you can ress people, or you can't, depending on what the entity that hands you the power wants.


----------



## Amphimir Míriel (Mar 19, 2008)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> You're character is Bob, he's a Cleric. He can cast Raise Dead. One week your adventuring companion Mirt the Stinky dies. You don't like him much (particularly how he smells), but out of fellowship and duty you case Raise Dead. Because "he has a Destiny", it works. The next week a band of orc raiders sweeps through your home town and (mercifully) kill Bob's sister. You rush home to "save" her, but your spell fizzles. You cast it exactly the same as last week, but she just doesn't "have a destiny." Too bad.




Heh, we are going to have to agree to disagree, because I think the above is an example of great storytelling and a way to add drama to the game.

The "hero who can save the world but lives with the shame of being unable to save his sister" is a great thing to roleplay.

BTW, if you don´t believe me, read Rich Burlew´s excellent "Order of the Stick" webcomic, it once featured a similarly dramatic event, regarding a failed Raise Dead spell.


----------



## FitzTheRuke (Mar 19, 2008)

small pumpkin man said:
			
		

> All it does is change he base assumption from "anybody can get raised unless there's a good reason not to" to "no-one can get raised unless there's a good reason they can".




This sums it up for me. What a great change. I love it.

Fitz


----------



## Plane Sailing (Mar 19, 2008)

robertliguori said:
			
		

> *sigh* Because we, as you might notice, are discussing D&D. We are not discussing Robert's Homebrew of D&D. The RAW is the common ground we share and generally take for granted when discussing a system. Moreover, the mere fact that there is such discussion on the topic shows that unlike Death Doesn't Inhibit Actions or Cleave + Bag of Rats, there is no clear consensus on particular applications of this rule being bad and wrong.




Well, no.

There isn't any point in discussing some theoretical basis of whether a rule is "bad" or "wrong". All rules exist as a baseline to be tweaked to meet peoples preferences and campaign qualities.

Eberron is a 3e setting. Forgotten Realms is a 3e setting. 

One of them has few high level NPCs, one has boatloads of them.

One of them makes it impossible to resurrect those dead more than about 7 days, the other doesn't.

But they are still both 3e settings.

On that scale of things the choice of whether to have a campaign where the default is "easy resurrection", "no resurrection", "only resurrection for those of destiny" or whatever is a completely reasonable thing to consider in the discussion.

Changing the way this works is several orders of magnitude less complex than (say) deciding to use armour as damage resistance or other major mechanics changes. Like it or not this is essentially just a flavour change and can be tweaked up and down with pretty much zero impact on how the play of your game varies from the play of his game.

Regards,


----------



## Irda Ranger (Mar 19, 2008)

DSRilk said:
			
		

> Rituals, as I understand them, might be a place where resurrection makes sense in my concept of the world.  Bad guy conjuring some horrible ritual in order to bring back a dead god, ancient evil, or his long dead master.  In short, it's a plot device, not a way to fix a game issue.



Ooh, I like it. Basically, like how Voldomort avoided death - but at a cost that makes it impossible for PCs to really emulate. 

"You can come back, but you won't come back the same, or alone.  It goes without saying that having spent time in the Raven Queen's Lands, you will never be the same. But far worse, when you crossed over, _something _came along for the ride."

Good, plot oozy goodness.

*****

As for the thread, going forward I entrust my votes to Robert Liguori to use at his discretion. Good show, sir!


----------



## DandD (Mar 19, 2008)

robertliguori said:
			
		

> I disagree.  I actually agree with the 4E tiers.
> At Heroic tier, you follow the rules of the world.  Ressurection is serious, scary stuffs, beyond your ken.
> 
> At Paragon tier, you can bend around the rules slightly.  You can journey to the underworld, and make a bargain with Hades, and hey, that's a 43 on your Perform check, so you have his approval...under these conditions.
> ...



Wait a minute. The way I read your posting, you basically agree with me in every way regarding raising people by making a dangerous voyage to the underworld, in contrast to the standart D&D-way of using dumb "Raise Dead"-spells and other stuff like "Ressurection". 

Either I can't read right, or you disagree with me on something I can't really fathom.


----------



## Falling Icicle (Mar 19, 2008)

If it wasn't someone's destiny to get eaten by a troll, how did it happen? This is one problem with this approach. Just what is destiny and just how much control does it have over events? It is inconceivable that in a world of multiple, very imperfect, different and rival gods, that destiny could be some kind of divine plan. There's simply no way the gods of good and evil would agree on what should be. So if destiny is not a divine plan, then what is it? Is it a power that transcends even the gods? And if so, then as I asked before, how is it that what is destined is not what always comes to pass? Who or what in the setting determines whether someone is "destined" for another chance?


----------



## HeinorNY (Mar 19, 2008)

I was thinking about a sim raise dead rules.

The cleric heals and regenerates the body until it's in perfect shape, or recreates it magically from a small part as hair or a nail or some blood.
Than the character must go to where the soul remains and bring it back to the material plane to puts it back inside the body.
If the soul was weak, it just went to some unreachable place or just vanished. If it was strong it may remains somewhere.


----------



## pukunui (Mar 19, 2008)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> Ooh, I like it. Basically, like how Voldomort avoided death - but at a cost that makes it impossible for PCs to really emulate.
> 
> "You can come back, but you won't come back the same, or alone.  It goes without saying that having spent time in the Raven Queen's Lands, you will never be the same. But far worse, when you crossed over, _something _came along for the ride."
> 
> Good, plot oozy goodness.



 Oooh, I really like that too!


----------



## HeinorNY (Mar 19, 2008)

Falling Icicle said:
			
		

> If it wasn't someone's destiny to get eaten by a troll, how did it happen?



It was his destiny to be eaten by a troll and then raised from the dead.


----------



## Fallen Seraph (Mar 19, 2008)

Falling Icicle said:
			
		

> If it wasn't someone's destiny to get eaten by a troll, how did it happen? This is one problem with this approach. Just what is destiny and just how much control does it have over events? It is inconceivable that in a world of multiple, very imperfect, different and rival gods, that destiny could be some kind of divine plan. There's simply no way the gods of good and evil would agree on what should be. So if destiny is not a divine plan, then what is it? Is it a power that transcends even the gods? And if so, then as I asked before, how is it that what is destined is not what always comes to pass? Who or what in the setting determines whether someone is "destined" for another chance?




Falling Icicle I am going to post two of my previous posts, that I think show atleast my view of this:



> I have always viewed Destiny as something that is in flux, it is that little thing that is always one-step ahead of you.
> 
> Destiny is the only true omnipresence in D&D. It is something that sees everything you will do, may do, and when. It sees what your true Destiny is, us as people may believe our Destiny lays in for your example slaying the great evil. But it truly wasn't it could be...
> 
> ...




The next quote was in relation to the whole Heroic, Paragon, Epic idea of Raise Dead:


> That could actually mean, that the Destiny to befowl you is loose and only when you begin to step into that Destiny that Destiny begins to become a presence in your life.
> 
> Sorta the idea, that one has the opportunity to step into one's Destiny either knowingly or unknowingly or mis-step and become simply a normal adventurer.




As for who controls Destiny and Fate if not the Gods, then the Fates, or the Stars or a force older then the universe... Any number of things, some Gods may have more knowledge of Destiny and Fate and as such can manipulate it, ie: Raven Queen but they do not have full-control.


----------



## Lurker37 (Mar 19, 2008)

Here's how I interpret the statements from the designers and what I've read in the previews:

The point of this rule is to prevent the DM from having to fudge the rules every time the question arises why <NPC> hasn't been raised from the dead. The goal is to have an in-game reason why only some people can be resurrected.

The mechanism chosen for this is destiny. The souls of those whose destinies are fulfilled move on, beyond the ability of any magic to retrieve.

Every sentient mortal entity in the game world has a destiny. This destiny confers no game advantage while the entity lives. (At least, there is no mention of such in anything I've read). This destiny is either 'fulfilled' or 'unfulfilled'.

If anyone, PC or NPC, dies with their destiny fulfilled, then they cannot be raised from the dead.

So, the trick seems to be working out when a destiny is fulfilled. We have seen no rules for this so far, so on that we can only speculate.

Here is my speculation - everything from here on is completely unfounded on any official announcements.

It is safe to assume, in my opinion, that many background NPCs will have relatively mundane destinies, which they have already fulfilled: Have children. Provide food for the village. Sell bread to that messenger who went on to warn the kingdom of an attack. Shoot that rabbit that would have otherwise startled the horse the baron's daughter was riding, causing her to fall and suffer a scar that would have prevented her marrying.... well, you get the idea. Not all these destinies are boring, but they do not require surviving to old age to fulfil. Furthermore, I assume that there is no in-game 'DING' that tells a character they have just fulfilled their destiny - that would be silly, in my opinion. So most people, especially those whose lives do not involve high drama and high adventure,  are unaware if their destiny is fulfilled.

There might, however, be a ritual you can perform to determine if resurrection is possible. That makes sense to me.

So, how are destinies assigned?

If Destiny is a random force in the game, then rolling on charts makes sense, I guess. If however a sentient force such as the gods choose destinies, then the DM, as the only person at the table who roleplays all the gods and the only one who knows enough about the major plotlines to simulate the gods' precognitive abilities when determining destiny,  must make a judgement call,  possibly according to some criteria or guidelines in the rules.

From the point of view of gameplay, assigning such destinies randomly could lead to plot problems such as those already discussed. Furthermore, it does not simulate mythic fantasy very well at all.

In most mythical settings suitable for use as inspiration for the standard D&D game, Destiny is not an impersonal force - it is controlled by one or more gods. Who roleplays the Gods? The DM.

So if Destiny is a decision made at each mortal's birth by the gods, then since DM plays the gods, the DM determines which major NPCs have unfulfilled destinies.

This all souinds great, until you remember one designer's comment that characters of level 1-10 tend to stay dead - if they die you roll up a new character.

So either a destiny can change during someone's lifetime ("Bulberan made a decision that would change the course of his destiny - forever!") or else there is some metagaming built into the rules along the lines of only PCs who survive to higher levels are proven to have noteworthy destinies.

As I hope this meandering tangle of rampant speculation illustrates, I think it's far too soon to be jumping to conclusions about how simulationist or gamist the actual rules are. We just don't know enough yet, and it's clearly going to be strongly influenced by whether 4E assumes a strong connection between the wills of the gods and mortals' destinies.


----------



## Will (Mar 19, 2008)

Personally, I've always liked the ancient concept of Fates being above gods, and weaving Destiny.

The idea that some schmuck adventurer is favored by Fates and can be resurrected, while the Holy Queen, your sister and benevolent leader of thousands, slips in a bathtub and breaks her neck is Destined to die and can't be resurrected...

That sucks, that's horrible, and that's exactly the kind of cursing the heavens I'd LIKE in a game.

And, hell, eventually maybe when the Fates decide someone you care about is destined to die... you go have a chat about that.


----------



## Fallen Seraph (Mar 19, 2008)

I sooooo, want to see a Warlock pact dealing with the Fates, I am tempted to alter one if I can to fit that concept, maybe the Stars one, given that Stars are related to Fate.


----------



## pukunui (Mar 19, 2008)

Lurker37 said:
			
		

> This all souinds great, until you remember one designer's comment that characters of level 1-10 tend to stay dead - if they die you roll up a new character.



To a certain extent, I don't have a problem with this. If you think of PCs as having _mana_ in the original Maori sense of the word (that is to say, mystical/spiritual power and prestige), then the more powerful they become (eg. the higher the level they attain), the more _mana_ they get and the more likely it is they will be "noticed" by whoever/whatever it is that decides whether or not they have fulfilled their destiny and can be brought back from the dead. This would help explain why lower level characters are more likely to stay dead than higher level ones.

On the other hand, we know that souls hang around in the Shadowfell for a while before passing into the deities' dominions or into the Great Beyond ... this opens up heaps of possibilities for low-level characters (or even higher-level ones) to go into the Shadowfell to try and rescue a fallen comrade. There may be something they can do to bring back a Heroic-level character. Pure speculation, though.

Also, I'm guessing that the first adventure, _Keep on the Shadowfell_, will have something to do with the PCs going into the Shadowfell to rescue/talk to a dead person.


----------



## Irda Ranger (Mar 19, 2008)

Will said:
			
		

> That sucks, that's horrible, and that's exactly the kind of cursing the heavens I'd LIKE in a game.



That's equal parts high drama (good!) and the DM deciding to screw with your character (bad!). I think the second one would get just as tired as any other DM fiat excuse after the fourth time or so.



			
				Will said:
			
		

> And, hell, eventually maybe when the Fates decide someone you care about is destined to die... you go have a chat about that.



Now this I _like_. 

PC: Yo! Zeus! I've got a bone to pick with you!
Zeus: <_Lightning-bolt-to-the-face_!>
PC: _laughter_
Zeus: Uh oh.


----------



## hong (Mar 19, 2008)

Falling Icicle said:
			
		

> If it wasn't someone's destiny to get eaten by a troll, how did it happen? This is one problem with this approach. Just what is destiny and just how much control does it have over events?




Destiny is something established after the fact, kind of like in the real world. Did you want to be raised? If so, then you have a destiny. Does the DM want that NPC to be raised? If so, then they have a destiny.

"Destiny" does not have to mean anything specific, like getting to 20th level and killing the grand foozle (or being killed by the grand foozle), unless you want it to. There will no doubt be some campaigns where such prophecies are interwoven into the plotline. There will also be others where they aren't.


----------



## robertliguori (Mar 19, 2008)

> Wait a minute. The way I read your posting, you basically agree with me in every way regarding raising people by making a dangerous voyage to the underworld, in contrast to the standart D&D-way of using dumb "Raise Dead"-spells and other stuff like "Ressurection".
> 
> Either I can't read right, or you disagree with me on something I can't really fathom.



I will sum up: the journey to the underworld should exist as a powerful mythic journey, a dark echo of every dungeon delve into the unknown, with ultimate risk and ultimate reward, but it should also be a journey into a real place, with actual, constant rules.  I want a system where you can represent Hades, god of the dead as utterly implacable at ninth level, able to be influenced with extreme skill and luck at nineteenth, and able to be beaten up and his stuff taken at twenty-ninth.  I want my mythic components built out of set-in-stone, understandable rules, and I want there to be either upper limits on how much the myth can work, or alternately, I want recognizable reality and expectations to be thrown out the window when they encounter the trump mythic reality.  It's great to have dragons that represent the destructive elements of human greed and who can be overcome through their lust for treasure, but it's also important to remember that no matter how much of the human condition they model, they are creatures who you can beat with an axe until dead (and then steal their eggs and raise their young in slavery).






			
				Amphimir Míriel said:
			
		

> Heh, we are going to have to agree to disagree, because I think the above is an example of great storytelling and a way to add drama to the game.
> 
> The "hero who can save the world but lives with the shame of being unable to save his sister" is a great thing to roleplay.
> 
> BTW, if you don´t believe me, read Rich Burlew´s excellent "Order of the Stick" webcomic, it once featured a similarly dramatic event, regarding a failed Raise Dead spell.




I am familiar with OoTS, and the event you mention.  I think it shows perfectly why the old rule  works fine.  (Note: Spoilers for old OotS ahead.  Go read it.  Now.  Seriously.  There is nothing in this thread more important than reading OotS if you haven't.

In the conclusion of the Azure City plotline, we see two important characters die; Lord Shojo, and Roy.  An attempt is made to resurrect Lord Shojo; however, the attempt fails.  We never hear from him directly, but we do hear a logical explanation from Belkar; Lord Shojo  is in Chaotic (mostly) Good Heaven, and has no particular desire to return only to be imprisoned for his crimes and shortly thereafter die of old age.  One could say that Lord Shojo, with his nonheroic character levels and negative Con modifier, was obviously a minion and had no destiny, and managed to rule Azure City so well by accident...or one could take Lord Shojo as a demonstration that heroism is not about having +5 to attack versus the city guards, but about not having those bonuses, and facing challenges anyway.

In an interesting parallel to this discussion, Roy's death takes place under exactly the conditions we now discuss; namely, Roy was under a familial blood oath to not find rest inside the gates of paradise.  However, the powers of Law and Good decide that this is a stupid-ass rule, and admit him anyway.  When Roy does eventually leave Heaven to try his best to aid his companions back in the mortal realm, it is not because the universe encouraged this choice; it's because Roy chose it.

If the rules of the universe are that characters with a destiny to fulfill can come back from the dead, then that is the expectation, because that is what most characters would choose.  The drama from both Shojo's failure to return and Roy's sojurn to the mortal realms as a spirit come from the fact that either reaction was possible, but the outcome depended on the choice of the person.



			
				Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> Ooh, I like it. Basically, like how Voldomort avoided death - but at a cost that makes it impossible for PCs to really emulate.
> 
> "You can come back, but you won't come back the same, or alone. It goes without saying that having spent time in the Raven Queen's Lands, you will never be the same. But far worse, when you crossed over, something came along for the ride."
> 
> ...



I'm going to chime in and declare a flat distate for such inherent mechanisms.  The Raven Lands are an actual place, where the PCs can go, ruled over by an NPC, whom the PCs can avoid, diplomize, or stabify.  Why?  Because one day long ago, you chose to set out and go adventuring, and have chosen to continue every day since.  You have chosen to fight, and been able to win, battle after battle after battle, and have now reached the point where when your own personal Death incarnates and tries to take you, you can have one of your buddies cast Death Ward and then murder your Death at your leisure.  You can exceed playing out the myths of Arachnae and Orpheus and start playing out the Titanomachy, with your party cast as the newly-ascendant gods.

I think there is room for both a HoH-esque resurrection ritual with side effects and "Spend a fraction of your net worth (more money than a commoner can easily imaging existing in one place) and undo the nature of mortality as a standard action." in the same universe.

Gods as characters, with the abilities and limitations of characters, is a trope that I like in my D&D.  If it makes sense for the god of the dead to be able to choose to release someone's soul, then it should be possible for your character to get into a position to make a similar choice.


----------



## hong (Mar 19, 2008)

small pumpkin man said:
			
		

> It doesn't. All it does is change he base assumption from "anybody can get raised unless there's a good reason not to" to "no-one can get raised unless there's a good reason they can".
> 
> Depending on your definition of "good reason", this could make no difference at all.



 I'm reminded of how 3E changed wizards "memorising" spells to "preparing" them.


----------



## Delta (Mar 19, 2008)

This seems a lot more Narrativist than Simulationist.


----------



## zoroaster100 (Mar 19, 2008)

I like this explanation.  It solves the problems in so many plots.  For example, I just read a big debate on Paizo's board about their current adventure path, where there is a death of a major NPC in the realm.  Some raised questions about how such a major NPC could stay dead and not simply be raised by one of the churches in the realm.  This solves the problem.  Otherwise there are no deaths of major NPCs except from old age, which makes it very hard to relate to such a world or create dramatic adventures.


----------



## drjones (Mar 19, 2008)

Sounds good to me.  I'd like it if the only way to tell that someones destiny has run out is to try to rez them, keeping an opportunity cost high and limiting the number of resurrections in the world even further.

I would take it a little more theatrically though, someone who does not qualify for a raise dead by standard means might still come back.. if truly despicable actions or transcendently pure sacrifices have taken place.  

Its a good rule but don't let that get in the way of a tasty story.  Literature (and b movies) are full of folks trying to bring back loved ones and paying terrible prices.


----------



## Kesh (Mar 19, 2008)

kinem said:
			
		

> Actually, as a pro-simulationist, I consider this yet another outrage.  What does "destiny" mean?  Why should the gods allow Harry the adventurer to be raised, only to see him fall into the next pit trap and die and be be left to rot, while the favored high priest has no 'destiny' and cannot be raised?




It could mean that they're including the Destiny mechanic from _Star Wars: Saga Edition_.


----------



## DandD (Mar 19, 2008)

robertliguori said:
			
		

> I will sum up: the journey to the underworld should exist as a powerful mythic journey, a dark echo of every dungeon delve into the unknown, with ultimate risk and ultimate reward, but it should also be a journey into a real place, with actual, constant rules.  I want a system where you can represent Hades, god of the dead as utterly implacable at ninth level, able to be influenced with extreme skill and luck at nineteenth, and able to be beaten up and his stuff taken at twenty-ninth.  I want my mythic components built out of set-in-stone, understandable rules, and I want there to be either upper limits on how much the myth can work, or alternately, I want recognizable reality and expectations to be thrown out the window when they encounter the trump mythic reality.  It's great to have dragons that represent the destructive elements of human greed and who can be overcome through their lust for treasure, but it's also important to remember that no matter how much of the human condition they model, they are creatures who you can beat with an axe until dead (and then steal their eggs and raise their young in slavery).



So, basically, you're agreeing with me all along?


----------



## Kwalish Kid (Mar 19, 2008)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> I've always assumed that "simulationist" means that you establish consistent rules within the game, and then let the world "emerge" in a complex way.  You don't dictate outcomes; you apply rules and simulate systems.



CPA: The Auditing


----------



## Wormwood (Mar 19, 2008)

small pumpkin man said:
			
		

> All it does is change he base assumption from "anybody can get raised unless there's a good reason not to" to "no-one can get raised unless there's a good reason they can".



Bears repeating.

A third time, in fact.


----------



## Wolfspider (Mar 19, 2008)

Wormwood said:
			
		

> Bears repeating.


----------



## Nom (Mar 19, 2008)

I don't think the rules are saying that it's DM fiat whether a PC gets raised.  Rather, they are enshrining it as player fiat.

Destiny = protagonist.

3E would at times pretend that PCs are not "blessed" by the metagame.  Sometimes it succeeded.  More often than not it just looked silly.  4E throws any such pretense out the window.  "You're a PC.  You're a protagonist.  You're special.  What the heck, let's call it 'Destiny'".

4E allows the DM to extend this conceit to NPCs, if appropriate.  But it still should be remarkable.  If your PCs are regularly using some technique to "make sure that they all stay dead", then you're doing something badly wrong (unless this _is_ a plot mechanic).  NPCs should only get raised because "they still have unfinished business", and hearing of it should tip the PC's off that "something big is going down".

That said, death seems unusual enough in 4E that it might be possible to ignore resurrection effects without messing up the system.


----------



## Irda Ranger (Mar 19, 2008)

zoroaster100 said:
			
		

> I like this explanation. It solves the problems in so many plots. For example, I just read a big debate on Paizo's board about their current adventure path, where there is a death of a major NPC in the realm. Some raised questions about how such a major NPC could stay dead and not simply be raised by one of the churches in the realm.
> Actually, this isn't a problem with the rules per se. This is a problem with the author of the adventure trying to use story hooks that don't make any sense (in D&D world).  He was lazy and borrowed story plot hooks from the real world, even though they don't translate at all.
> 
> It would have been just as faulty to write an adventure that turned on not knowing who in the town is a disguised outsider, when a simple _Protection of Evil, 10' radius_ would answer the question.
> ...


----------



## Wormwood (Mar 19, 2008)




----------



## BryonD (Mar 19, 2008)

eleran said:
			
		

> How would a simulationist approach Raise Dead then?  I am anxious to see how Raise Dead works in the real world.



You really have no clue what simulationist means.


----------



## Kzach (Mar 19, 2008)

robertliguori said:
			
		

> Allow me to educate you.



I tried to learn from you but I failed to care enough.


----------



## Dragongrief (Mar 19, 2008)

Here's my take on 4e Raising and 'Destiny', which I'll be using whenever I run a 4e game (assuming the final rules don't invalidate it).

This is based on the statement that:
1) Herioc tier raising is near impossible
2) Paragon tier is still difficult
3) Epic tier is a "speed bump"

Destiny is a sentient force which is trying to keep the mortal world on a certain path (or lead it to a particular end).  It is unaffiliated with any gods or other powers and seeks only to lead the world toward it's purpose.  To this end, it assists those whose actions are in line with it's goals, gathering around them as they grow in power.

The greatest interference with Destiny's cause is Free Will, but this is also a weapon it uses to get back on track.  When some great disturbance occurs (constantly happening/ongoing in a PoL campaign), Destiny seeks out those who have proven that they may be able to correct the situation and gently guides them towards a purpose (READ: they come across the appropriate adventure opportunities).  While doing so, it grants them certain advantages that most beings don't have (ressurrection).

Both Herioc and Villianous beings can have purpose.  GENERALLY, herioc beings are there to set things right and villians are there to test them and make sure they are truely capable of being the heroes.  There are also some beings who are outside the bounds of Destiny (i.e. Godlike beings); these beings may be raised should they die, but the method would be much different than raising a mortal.

What the tiers mean:

*Herioc* - Most characters in this tier have not been noticed/recognized by Destiny, thus being raised is nearly impossible.  Should a character die in some truly epic manner (delaying an oncoming horde alone long enough that the town could escape safely would likely count), Destiny may take enough notice that raising is possible but still extremely difficult.

*Paragon* - Characters have been noticed by Destiny, however they have not yet shown that they are the 'Stuff of Legends'.  Raising is possible but is still difficult, and should a character be repeatedly killed in 'non-meaningful' encounters, Destiny may lose interest (effectively putting them on-par with Herioc tiers for raise dead).

*Epic* - You are Legend.  Your power makes you someone to be respected and feared.  Your actions can change worlds.  Destiny pools around you to try and guide you to making the 'correct' decisions.


So those are my thoughts on the in-game logic on why Raise Dead works the way it does.  Obviously the characters won't know about Destiny and it's goals (the players may not either), but the adventures should put them on the right track (my group is just happy to play, so I don't get any "railroad" complaints by offering few options at once).


----------



## Guild Goodknife (Mar 19, 2008)

As someone pointed out earlier this change sounds a lot more Narrativist than Simulationist... and i love it!!!   The story as a whole is much more important to me an my players than the accurate simulation of a fantasy world where the strictly defined rules work the same way for everybody, so this small change fills me with joy, as it sounds way more atmospheric and interessting to me than the old approach. I like it because it evokes a stronger sense of wonder and returns a bit of mystery to death and dieing!


----------



## Roman (Mar 19, 2008)

I have been using something similar (along with other modifications to resurrection/raising/...) as a houserule for a long time. In my campaign, only characters that have a destiny desirable to the deity doing the resurrecting can be raised.


----------



## Dire Lemming (Mar 19, 2008)

Wow.  It's always bugged me about how in D&D computer games only PCs could be raised.  Now we're going to have that kind of random idiotic limitation in 4E as well?  :\


----------



## hong (Mar 19, 2008)

Dire Lemming said:
			
		

> Wow.  It's always bugged me about how in D&D computer games only PCs could be raised.  Now we're going to have that kind of random idiotic limitation in 4E as well?  :\



 Well, you can always ban raise dead. I did just that in my last game, in fact!


----------



## Dausuul (Mar 19, 2008)

Well, if we're going to have resurrection, this is a good way to go about it.  Nice, simple, and totally sufficient to explain why PCs can be resurrected but most people can't--much better than 3E's "uh, most people don't want to be released from eternal torment in the Nine Hells" excuse.

Still, I hope the game can tolerate an outright ban on resurrection magic if the DM and players are so inclined.  3E didn't handle that very well at higher levels.


----------



## Celebrim (Mar 19, 2008)

Stalker0 said:
			
		

> Raise Dead: Its one of those things that is always an issue for world builders. How does a society deal with a world in raising the dead is so easy? Kings that can just come back, high priests that cannot really be killed.




Ok, since you ask.

You know how in stories when the villain(ess) captures the prince(ess) and instead of killing them immediately, they always say something like, "We can't kill them now.  We have to do this in the right way."  

Well, in my campaign, when they say that, ressurection is one of the things that they are planning against.  Kings often can just come back.  But anyone powerful likely to plan an assassination of a king or prince will realize that there are far more permenent ways of getting rid of a king than simply killing them, and which at least partially take the matter out of the gods hands.  Like for example, turning them into a frog and leaving them in random ponds.  Wicked queens anxious to dispose of younger rivals take pains to insure that the body of thier victim is never found, up to and including cannibalism.  Evil priests insure that the soul is devoured by ancient evils, never to return.  Evil wizards imprison the souls of thier enemies in gems, which are lost to dragon hordes, buried in ancient tombs, or dropped into deep wells.  

Death might not be permenent, but there are things worse than death.    



> Everyone has their own reason, but those reasons are often hand waves on the "realism" of the world.




My stories work under faerie tale logic.  Realism is just part of the pastiche.



> So I greatly applaud 4e's way to handle raise dead:
> 
> "You can only be raised if you have an unfulfilled destiny."




Hasn't this always been part of the assumption?  I can't find a 1st edition quote, but I would assume no one has to come back that doesn't want to.  My take was always, "Does the character have anything they think worth coming back for?"  True love?  A good mutton, lettuse, and tomato sandwich?  If so, ressurection is possible, if not terribly common.  Your average merchant prince watching his family falling to squabbling over his inheritance and secretly hoping he stays dead generally decides that he's better taking his chances on the next life.  You average high priest decides now is the time to take his reward.  Kings decide to leave thier lands in the hands of thier son.  Some of course come back, but its not a 100% thing.  Actually, there was a defined chance of failure in 1st edition.


----------



## Sir Sebastian Hardin (Mar 19, 2008)

You know what....

The Destiny of all my PCs (other than their own motivations and personal quests) is to fulfill the friggin' goal of the campaign i've spent hours and hours thinking, writing and whatever (Kill the BBEG, save the world, save a country, destroy an evil God...)

If Bob the fighter want's to kill hes evil brother, good for him. I'll probably let him do so... conectim him with the story or something... But Bob might discover, that killing his brother was actually part of a biger picture.... his destiny is beyond what he once thought.


----------



## Kishin (Mar 19, 2008)

kinem said:
			
		

> Actually, as a pro-simulationist, I consider this yet another outrage.  What does "destiny" mean?  Why should the gods allow Harry the adventurer to be raised, only to see him fall into the next pit trap and die and be be left to rot, while the favored high priest has no 'destiny' and cannot be raised?




I would argue that rationalization the motivations of divine beings is a difficult if not impossible  task.


----------



## small pumpkin man (Mar 19, 2008)

for those not reading the thread in the news forum.



			
				Hellcow said:
			
		

> I'll note that I was paraphrasing in my LJ entry. The actual description of _raise dead_ doesn't use the term "destiny". The key point is that _raise dead_ isn't something that can be performed casually as a public service - the precise wording will come out when WotC releases something official. Most likely, I've said more than I should of as is.




There's more there worth readin too, but it's not directly relevant to the disscussion like this is.


----------



## billd91 (Mar 19, 2008)

I can't say that I favor the change in flavor because I don't really see a significant difference. DM decides whether or not NPC gets raised in either case. In 4e, he doesn't have an unfinished destiny and can't be raised. In 3.5, he was satisfied with being in the afterlife and didn't want to come back and can't be raised. 

I may prefer the 3.5 flavor actually because then it's about the choice of the character rather than cosmic fiat. And if you've finally arrived in whatever heaven your religion espouses... why would you want to go back to the world where you died a violent death anyway? That's why I've always considered raisings rare.


----------



## Sir Sebastian Hardin (Mar 19, 2008)

billd91 said:
			
		

> I can't say that I favor the change in flavor because I don't really see a significant difference. DM decides whether or not NPC gets raised in either case. In 4e, he doesn't have an unfinished destiny and can't be raised. In 3.5, he was satisfied with being in the afterlife and didn't want to come back and can't be raised.
> 
> I may prefer the 3.5 flavor actually because then it's about the choice of the character rather than cosmic fiat. And if you've finally arrived in whatever heaven your religion espouses... why would you want to go back to the world where you died a violent death anyway? That's why I've always considered raisings rare.




I was thinking...
Maybe it is a good character concept... Maybe a morally devastated hero who ended his life with suicide that was suddenly raised by a mysterious (good) cleric. Inspite of being disgusted with life he has to deal with it because he has some destiny to achieve, being reluctanct until he decides to embrace it


----------



## cougent (Mar 19, 2008)

As someone still debating the switch to 4E, this actually seems like the weakest justification or explanation I have seen yet.  I will wait for the final rules, I will read them over and over, but at first blush this too looks very much like "hand waving" justification.


----------



## small pumpkin man (Mar 19, 2008)

cougent said:
			
		

> As someone still debating the switch to 4E, this actually seems like the weakest justification or explanation I have seen yet.  I will wait for the final rules, I will read them over and over, but at first blush this too looks very much like "hand waving" justification.



To quote Hong.
"WHY DOESN'T ANYONE LISTEN TO ME!?"


----------



## Ridley's Cohort (Mar 19, 2008)

Wolfspider said:
			
		

> But how does this change the use of raise dead in a practical sense?




It is an invitation for the DM to ask the player what that destiny might be.  It is an invitation for the DM and player to collaborate and sketch out a destiny, either before or after the tragic event.

In terms of flavor, this makes an immense amount of sense.

Of course, the DM always has the option to simply agree with the player who says "Uh, yeah.  A big destiny of some sort."


----------



## Li Shenron (Mar 19, 2008)

Stalker0 said:
			
		

> Raise Dead: Its one of those things that is always an issue for world builders. How does a society deal with a world in raising the dead is so easy? Kings that can just come back, high priests that cannot really be killed.
> 
> Everyone has their own reason, but those reasons are often hand waves on the "realism" of the world.
> 
> ...




It sounds like a good enough explanation to me.

Although I don't think it's strictly needed in our games where:

1) the amount of people in the world who can Raise Dead is small

2) heaven is a nice place (not a place where evil PC teleport to kill petitioners and get XP), and practically every normal person that goes there and is not stupid will not want to come back and run the risk of being sent somewhere else next time

3) PCs rarely die, period


----------



## pukunui (Mar 19, 2008)

small pumpkin man said:
			
		

> for those not reading the thread in the news forum.
> 
> 
> 
> There's more there worth readin too, but it's not directly relevant to the disscussion like this is.



 I suspected as much. I tried to point that out, too, but I was ignored (this seems to happen a lot. Is it because I have a low post count or something?).


----------



## small pumpkin man (Mar 19, 2008)

pukunui said:
			
		

> I suspected as much. I tried to point that out, too, but I was ignored (this seems to happen a lot. Is it because I have a low post count or something?).



I think it's more that rational non-objectionable discourse doesn't get immediately replied to, which means it doesn't show up 7 times in quotes and people forget to read it.


----------



## Fallen Seraph (Mar 19, 2008)

small pumpkin man said:
			
		

> I think it's more that rational non-objectionable discourse doesn't get immediately replied to, which means it doesn't show up 7 times in quotes and people forget to read it.




Which can be aggravating since those posts can lead to really fun debates and discussion.


----------



## Baron Opal (Mar 19, 2008)

eleran said:
			
		

> How would a simulationist approach Raise Dead then?  I am anxious to see how Raise Dead works in the real world.




Come to my hospital and I'll show you. There are several material components, some of them are entertaining to use. And it costs a _hell_ of a lot more than a nice diamond. Three months ago we brought back someone who was completely exsanguinated for 15 minutes. That was pretty tricky, I admit, but we did it.


----------



## hong (Mar 19, 2008)

billd91 said:
			
		

> I can't say that I favor the change in flavor because I don't really see a significant difference. DM decides whether or not NPC gets raised in either case. In 4e, he doesn't have an unfinished destiny and can't be raised. In 3.5, he was satisfied with being in the afterlife and didn't want to come back and can't be raised.
> 
> I may prefer the 3.5 flavor actually because then it's about the choice of the character rather than cosmic fiat. And if you've finally arrived in whatever heaven your religion espouses... why would you want to go back to the world where you died a violent death anyway? That's why I've always considered raisings rare.



 Whereas I like how 4E spins it, not just because it's basically how I spin it already, but also because the concept of people being able to choose whether to come back from the dead and rejecting the opportunity is not something that crops up at all in any real-world cultural tradition I'm aware of.


----------



## pukunui (Mar 19, 2008)

small pumpkin man said:
			
		

> I think it's more that rational non-objectionable discourse doesn't get immediately replied to, which means it doesn't show up 7 times in quotes and people forget to read it.



 LOL. You're probably right.


----------



## Derren (Mar 19, 2008)

eleran said:
			
		

> How would a simulationist approach Raise Dead then?  I am anxious to see how Raise Dead works in the real world.




Where you are wrong:
Simulationist doesn't mean "like in the real world"


How to deal with Raise Dead (3E) in a simulationist way:

A) -- The creative approach
Craft a world where Raise Dead is simply part of the society. Nobles and wealthy individuals simply do not stay dead unless they are killed in a special way and they don't have a good standing with the local churches. Assassinations are more of a warning or temporary distraction, the possession of diamonds is heavily regulated by the nobles and diamond mines are among the most fought over places in the world.

B) -- The rule 0 way
Either the DM disallows Raise Dead (&Co) completely or makes it harder to pull of which means requiring hard to get spell components. But if the PCs use it to raise some NPC instead of sayving it for personal (group) use then it works and the plot progresses accordingly

C) -- The lazy way (not really simulationist)
Ignore it and hope that the PCs don't ask questions.

Not surprisingly I favor approach A.


----------



## DeusExMachina (Mar 19, 2008)

I love this explanation. I always felt Raise Dead was just cheating, so most of the times I just didn't allow it at all, but this way I could see it working.

My problem was always that a character who just made this heroic stand against a pursuing dragon and gave his life to give his companions time to escape from the collapsing ruins, shouldn't be brought back simply because you can cast Raise Dead so many times as a 15th level cleric.
According to this new rule, saving his companions would have been his destiny and now that it is fulfilled, he won't be coming back anymore. That's exactly the kind of narrative I wanted to be able to add to my game...


----------



## Wormwood (Mar 19, 2008)

Celebrim said:
			
		

> Hasn't this always been part of the assumption?



Yes it has.

Nice to see it codified.


----------



## shilsen (Mar 19, 2008)

Derren said:
			
		

> Where you are wrong:
> Simulationist doesn't mean "like in the real world"




Most of the time simulationist means "What the person currently using it wants it to mean." Kinda like "gamist" and "narrativist" and all of that other garbage.



> How to deal with Raise Dead (3E) in a simulationist way:
> 
> A) -- The creative approach
> Craft a world where Raise Dead is simply part of the society. Nobles and wealthy individuals simply do not stay dead unless they are killed in a special way and they don't have a good standing with the local churches. Assassinations are more of a warning or temporary distraction, the possession of diamonds is heavily regulated by the nobles and diamond mines are among the most fought over places in the world.
> ...




Hey, whatever works for you. Personally, I think there are all kinds of ways to be simulationist. It just depends on what it is that you're trying to simulate. For me, 4e's approach to Raise Dead works well for simulating mythology. One of the standard tropes in myth, whether you look at Greek or Teutonic or Indian or Celtic or most others is that some people play by completely different rules to others. And who these people are is usually heavily arbitrary, depending mainly on whether they are the protagonists of the given tales or myth cycles. This kind of approach to Raise Dead fits perfectly with that attitude. I've always maintained that D&D in play is much closer to mythology than to most fantasy, and 4e in many ways is more explicitly hewing to that standard.

Of course, there's one other way I know this is a great rule. I've been using it for years now. And if D&D ever uses a rule I've been using for a long time, that means it's a great rule. Simple


----------



## Revinor (Mar 19, 2008)

DeusExMachina said:
			
		

> According to this new rule, saving his companions would have been his destiny and now that it is fulfilled, he won't be coming back anymore. That's exactly the kind of narrative I wanted to be able to add to my game...




So, basically, you will penalize him for heroic efforts? If somebody dies because of stupidity, he can be ressed. If somebody plays a hero, he foregos his chance for ressurection ?

Always look at the rules not only from the point 'are they elegant' (anyway, this one is not), but also 'what kind of behaviors do they encourage'. In this case, if we assume that players like to play their characters (safe assumption I think if they have reached 15th level), you encourage not-fulfilling their desitinies/being heroic.

It goes even further. Reasonable PC should let his lifetime villain escape, instead of killing him - by killing your archfoe, you give up chances for raise dead.


----------



## Mustrum_Ridcully (Mar 19, 2008)

Revinor said:
			
		

> So, basically, you will penalize him for heroic efforts? If somebody dies because of stupidity, he can be ressed. If somebody plays a hero, he foregos his chance for ressurection ?



If someone says "no to ressourection", this is the best opportunity. You did something great - rescued your comrades, sacrificed yourself for the greater good. It wasn't just some Bodak looking at you the wrong way...

If I as a player was given the choice, this would probably where I'd consider not to get my character raised. 
But - maybe it wasn't actually his destiny. Or it is his destiny to rescue his friends, but not this time?  
It's only a penalty if the DM insists "this was your characters destiny" while the player disagrees.


----------



## eleran (Mar 19, 2008)

BryonD said:
			
		

> You really have no clue what simulationist means.




or you have no clue what facetious means.  Take your pick.


----------



## eleran (Mar 19, 2008)

Derren said:
			
		

> Where you are wrong:
> Simulationist doesn't mean "like in the real world"
> 
> 
> ...





For the record, the question was legitimate, the statement after was just me being sarcastic.

I would choose B out of your 3 choices.


----------



## WayneLigon (Mar 19, 2008)

I'll be interested in seeing how this works when we see it in it's final form, but the concept is something I don't have much of a problem with. In most campaigns I've done, the PCs do make a mark on the world; they're important to it in a way few things or people are, so they have a destiny of a type.


----------



## Revinor (Mar 19, 2008)

Mustrum_Ridcully said:
			
		

> It's only a penalty if the DM insists "this was your characters destiny" while the player disagrees.




And this is exactly was suggested in original post. 3e had a rules for rejecting raise dead and it is good enough. 4e calls for DM to arbitrary reject raise dead, and while it might be ok, I don't think that doing it to players who played well is good idea.


----------



## DandD (Mar 19, 2008)

I choose D) There is no ressurection/raise magic spell, safe for those found in books like the Necronomicon and other vile lore, and bringing back people with such spells make the ressurected feel emptier, more evil and otherwordly, and very, very estranged with life. And they all feel the urging need to serve malicious forces from beyond the veil of reality and sanity. 
If you really want to bring back your slain sister or your fellow party member, go fight some giant three-headed muts who breath fire and chew on human bones guarding portals to the Everafter, and watch out for vengeful erynies who will harass you for breaking natural laws, like dead people who should stay dead, and other stuff.


----------



## hong (Mar 19, 2008)

Revinor said:
			
		

> And this is exactly was suggested in original post. 3e had a rules for rejecting raise dead and it is good enough. 4e calls for DM to arbitrary reject raise dead, and while it might be ok, I don't think that doing it to players who played well is good idea.



 Eh. 4E just puts into 9-point serif type what most people were probably doing already, whatever their in-game rationale was.


----------



## DeusExMachina (Mar 19, 2008)

Revinor said:
			
		

> So, basically, you will penalize him for heroic efforts? If somebody dies because of stupidity, he can be raised. If somebody plays a hero, he forgoes his chance for resurrection ?
> 
> Always look at the rules not only from the point 'are they elegant' (anyway, this one is not), but also 'what kind of behaviors do they encourage'. In this case, if we assume that players like to play their characters (safe assumption I think if they have reached 15th level), you encourage not-fulfilling their destinies/being heroic.
> 
> It goes even further. Reasonable PC should let his lifetime villain escape, instead of killing him - by killing your archfoe, you give up chances for raise dead.





The point is that I never have problems if my character dies after a heroic stand. I like it, most people in my group like it and will happily make a new character and play on. They get pissed if their character dies because of a random 1 on a save or die roll from a random encounter (I'm glad save or die has gone too btw)...

And I don't think my players are such rules lawyers that they will not kill the bad guy just so their character will have a raise should they die. That would go against the whole point of doing a fantasy adventure roleplay. If they didn't want the chance of dying, they should have become farmers and not adventurers.
Also I reckon there will still be penalties associated with being raised, so playing stupid just os you can say "butit was not my destiny to die in such a stupid way" is in my opinion rather... ehm... stupid... It's still better not to die at all...

Of course, in the end it will still come down to player and DM actually wanting to bring the character back or not, no matter how he died. I just think this explanation works better in the whole world and gives heroic adventuring a good narrative for bringing people backf rom the dead...


----------



## Knightlord (Mar 19, 2008)

The Raise Dead explaination is good enough for me. Heroes come and go, some live and some die. But those who survive long enough in a world of danger transcend (go above 10th level) from the lives of just heroes and move forward to complete a heroic goal. If a hero falters in his steps, then the gods make it just that, a faltering. Same goes for villains. I really don't see the problem, though I understand everyone has their own take on reality.

Just my 0.02.


----------



## WayneLigon (Mar 19, 2008)

Derren said:
			
		

> A) -- The creative approach
> Craft a world where Raise Dead is simply part of the society. Nobles and wealthy individuals simply do not stay dead unless they are killed in a special way and they don't have a good standing with the local churches. Assassinations are more of a warning or temporary distraction, the possession of diamonds is heavily regulated by the nobles and diamond mines are among the most fought over places in the world.




I like the way that Brust deals with it in his Dragaera series. Killing someone is a good way of sending a message. They get ressurected provided they have the ten thousand or so gold it requires and life goes on.

Of course, this means that someone had to find a way to make it permanent. For a whole pile of gold you can purchase an assassination with a Morganti weapon which kills the soul, making ressurection impossible. People tend to take that a great deal more seriously.


----------



## Derren (Mar 19, 2008)

Another anti-simulationist thing about this rule is the rationale of even trying to raise someone. According to WotC raise dead will have a quite high cost, at least at paragon level so why waste this resources when it is so unlikely that the raise dead works (other than Metagaming, "hes a PC so the DM will likely let him be raised")?


----------



## hong (Mar 19, 2008)

Derren said:
			
		

> Another anti-simulationist thing about this rule is the rationale of even trying to raise someone. According to WotC raise dead will have a quite high cost, at least at paragon level so why waste this resources when it is so unlikely that the raise dead works (other than Metagaming, "hes a PC so the DM will likely let him be raised")?




That's why you ask first.


----------



## WayneLigon (Mar 19, 2008)

DandD said:
			
		

> If you really want to bring back your slain sister or your fellow party member, go fight some giant three-headed muts who breath fire and chew on human bones guarding portals to the Everafter, and watch out for vengeful erynies who will harass you for breaking natural laws, like dead people who should stay dead, and other stuff.




That sounds really nice but it gets boring the third or fourth time you do it... 
Basically, as long as D&D has trivial ways to die, it needs trivial ways to bring you back. You don't want people just coming back from the dead willy-nilly, then get rid of the ability for a housecat to kill my first-level wizard.


----------



## Will (Mar 19, 2008)

To the folks saying 'bah, I was already doing this': making the explanation part of the game means that the rest of the mechanics, demographics, and settings will incorporate this idea, rather than forcing you to go through and tweak anything that doesn't match up.


----------



## hong (Mar 19, 2008)

Will said:
			
		

> To the folks saying 'bah, I was already doing this': making the explanation part of the game means that the rest of the mechanics, demographics, and settings will incorporate this idea, rather than forcing you to go through and tweak anything that doesn't match up.



 Hey! What about those saying "yay! I was already doing this"?


----------



## HP Dreadnought (Mar 19, 2008)

This is an awesome change for the game and I'm glad to see they addressed it.  ne more reason to buy 4th.


----------



## DandD (Mar 19, 2008)

WayneLigon said:
			
		

> That sounds really nice but it gets boring the third or fourth time you do it...
> Basically, as long as D&D has trivial ways to die, it needs trivial ways to bring you back. You don't want people just coming back from the dead willy-nilly, then get rid of the ability for a housecat to kill my first-level wizard.



The obvious thing would be to power up your first-level wizard that he can survive a housecat, which appearantly in D&D 4th edition, they did. Yay.
And of course, trying not to die would be the most sensible way to avoid entering the dark caves to the underworld regularely. Adding self-heal abilities for every class and so having less need for a cleric should help too. 

Or, you just admit that being dead in D&D simply is the same like in Final Fantasy, and it means you're only combat-handicapped for now, but can still function fine in cutscenes and buy stuff. They just lie down on the ground whenever combat happens. 

Both are fine, but the latter I rather play on the PS 2 (and the SNES).


----------



## Li Shenron (Mar 19, 2008)

Derren said:
			
		

> C) -- The lazy way (not really simulationist)
> Ignore it and hope that the PCs don't ask questions.
> 
> Not surprisingly I favor approach A.




Heh, that's not just "not really simulationist". That is practically the definition of "gamist" (although I disagree on the use of word "lazy").


----------



## shilsen (Mar 19, 2008)

hong said:
			
		

> Hey! What about those saying "yay! I was already doing this"?



 Beat me to it!


----------



## hong (Mar 19, 2008)

shilsen said:
			
		

> Beat me to it!



 Bah, I beat you to it back in post #114.

HAW HAW!


----------



## Baka no Hentai (Mar 19, 2008)

Revinor said:
			
		

> It goes even further. Reasonable PC should let his lifetime villain escape, instead of killing him - by killing your archfoe, you give up chances for raise dead.





Unless, of course, choosing not to kill your arch-foe means that you have turned your back on your destiny, and thus you will not be able to come back if you die.

A free-willed being can choose not to carry out the tasks he is destined for. That same being should not count on the help of the Furies if he happens to get run over by an apple-cart the next day...


----------



## Satori5000 (Mar 19, 2008)

In the home games i play in, the DM decides what happens as far as fate and that kind of thing.  If the high priest needs to come back, then he can.  If not, then sux to be him.  I agree with the philosophy that destiny means whether or not the player wants to continue that character.
The best part about raise dead is that i am glad there are no negative levels for it


----------



## Aenghus (Mar 19, 2008)

I will note that everyone who abolishes or massively restricts resurrection magic in previous editions of the game is applying house-rules - the core setting assumes the (limited) availability of this magic.

I really don't know why the discussion here has centred on PC resurrection, when the rule is actually meant to address NPC resurrection primarily, and its consequences for the game world. 

In previous editions core D&D has always failed to address in a coherent way why the rich and powerful are not constantly raised/resurrected. The societies portrayed in the backgrounds and novels don't reflect the availability of this sort of magic. I'm not surprised as it produces a very different setting feel where eg. in the case of the Steven Brust _Dragaera_ books people are killed as a _warning_ with the expectation they would be subsequently raised. While such ideas are intriguing and can be played with, a setting closer to our own is easier to plot for and easier for players to understand.

What the rule does is imply campaign settings where most NPCs die permanently, and there is no automatic expectation that the rich and famous can be routinely resurrected. It implies a world closer to our own, where the vast majority of people fear death as permanent, whether  they be paupers or princes. It allows mundane assassinations without high-powered magic, duels to the actual death etc. This makes the mechanics of the typical campaign better match the setting writeups and plots typical in gaming and other literature, and as such is more consistent than just ignoring the whole issue. Consistency is a core component of simulationism as I understand it and so it could be said the rule is more simulationist for the average campaign world.

Resurrection magic was in the game to compensate for the arbitrarily high chance of death in mid to high level adventuring. Low level pcs just died, mid level pcs might be raised with difficulty, high level pcs generally got rezzed if the players wanted to still play them. The more IC hated and OOC appreciated a BBEG the more likely they would return even from death. What has been described for 4e PC resurrection is basically what happened in most of the D&D campaigns I played in or ran in previous editions.

The PCs are generally exceptional. This sort of thing is always a negotiation between the player and the DM, where the player wants the PC back and the DM has to consider the ramifications of allowing it. Do remember it can be the other way around as well - sometimes the DM wants the PC to come back due to ongoing plot reasons and the player may want a new character.

I like this rule as IMO it won't change anything for the PCs, but makes the average campaign world more consistent. And for those who don't like resurrection, the rule can work for you as well, maybe no-one has a destiny to return, or perhaps its a one in a million chance that just might work...


----------



## billd91 (Mar 19, 2008)

Sir Sebastian Hardin said:
			
		

> I was thinking...
> Maybe it is a good character concept... Maybe a morally devastated hero who ended his life with suicide that was suddenly raised by a mysterious (good) cleric. Inspite of being disgusted with life he has to deal with it because he has some destiny to achieve, being reluctanct until he decides to embrace it




It's an interesting idea. Finding out who the priest is and why he keeps raising the character could lead to an interesting campaign. But if it's really important, I'd even have the gods just raise the character automatically until he achieves his destiny.

But I would want that to be how most characters or NPCs are raised.


----------



## Stormtalon (Mar 19, 2008)

Hmmm, with this I could also see Raise Dead perhaps used as a curse -- a high-powered ritual inflicted on a late-heroic character, ensuring that he not only dies _a lot_ but comes back from it in the most agonizing way possible.  At that point, you have a character who finds himself perhaps looking for a way to finally rest, but Destiny or some other force is actively keeping him from it -- and not telling him why.


----------



## Dausuul (Mar 19, 2008)

billd91 said:
			
		

> I may prefer the 3.5 flavor actually because then it's about the choice of the character rather than cosmic fiat. And if you've finally arrived in whatever heaven your religion espouses... why would you want to go back to the world where you died a violent death anyway? That's why I've always considered raisings rare.




And if you got sent to the Nine Hells and are now burning in agony, you'd rather stay there, too?


----------



## DM_Blake (Mar 19, 2008)

Where do you draw the line?

Why doesn't the farmer have a "destiny" to be a good husband, a good father, raise children and teach them right from wrong, and live a good life? Isn't that a destiny? Well, then, he gets a raise dead too.

OK, if that's too much of a stretch for the "Must have a destiny" rule, then surely a king, or a high priest, or a leader of a guild of thieves, surely guys like these have a destiny? Guys like these have bards singing songs about them, have thousands or tens of thousands of people who know them and revere (or fear) them. Surely they have enough destiny to be raised?

As for me, I don't see the need for this silly rule. 

Raising the dead needs no "destiny" at all. It never has, and never will, require destiny.

In my 3E game, you can raise a farmer from the dead if you want to.

So, you ask why everyone doesn't live forever?

Simple:
1. Raise dead costs a lot of money. The gem is expensive and casting the spell destroys the gem. Want to come back? You better be wealthy. This is why farmers and goatherds and barmaids never get raised - they can't afford it and they almost never have a wealthy relative or friend who will pony up the cash.
2. Raise dead requires a relatively intact corpse. There are many ways to die that Raise Dead can't fix. The better versions of the spell are harder to find (how many level 18 priests are there in the world, anyway?) and more expensive, so they are out of the reach of just about anyone. If you die to dragon fire, or acid, or get eaten by a hungry ogre, you better be really rich and very well connected to know someone with the right spell and be able to pay for the component.
3. None of these spells handles aging. Even the wealthiest king in all the world, with dozens of epic priests running around eager to True Resurrect the king in a moments notice can die of old age. You don't come back from that. (Maybe this is a bit of a house rule - I haven't read True Resurrect in so long I don't remember if it "cures" old age or not, but it doesn't in my campaign).
4. Heaven (etc.) is very nice for just about anyone. No matter which god you worship, when you die and move on to that god's realm, you tend to be happy you got there (not always true for those foolish enough to worship vile evil gods, though if they serve those gods well, their afterlife is pretty cushy too). Some people just don't want to come back once they sample the afterlife. This comes fairly close to "having a destiny" - if you cast raise dead on someone, they can refuse it; many people do refuse it unless they feel they have a reason to come back, such as fulfilling a destiny. (note: this is why PCs can't just kill the villain then resurrect him for interrogation - he will almost always prefer his afterlife to being resurrected and tortured, then probably killed again anyway - even if the PCs don't plan to torture or re-kill him, he will expect them to do that, or imprison him, and will refuse the resurrection).
5. There are ways to capture a soul. A captured soul cannot be resurrected. The magic needed is not really much harder to come by than the magic to cast resurrection. Therefore, an assassin who kills a farmer will probably just stab him, or poison him, or maybe decapitation (raise dead won't work in this case) - that should be enough. But high-level assassins who take contracts on wealthy merchants, priests, nobility, royalty, etc., will usually plan ahead with soul-capturing magic (it's all covered in the fee they require to take the job). Thus, the assassinated king cannot usually be resurrected until the soul is freed from its imprisonment - this can be a truly epic quest indeed, if the assassin is resourceful enough (and any assassin who accepts a contract on a king better be very, very resourceful indeed).
6. Story reasons. Maybe he's a ruthless tyrant king and the only church around with priests high enough level to True Resurrect him from the assassin who stabbed him and dumped him in a bag of holding full of lye refuses to do it because he was hated and feared. Maybe in some other story, the priest casts the spell but the god refuses it because the dead guy lived a life that is against the ideals of that god's faith - no resurrection for the wicked (or no resurrection for the wimpy, scholarly sage if you ask a priest of Kord to cast the spell). There can be bazillions of reasons to have the priests refuse to cast the spell, or have their spell fail due to godly whim, all justified by the existing story. You can even incorporate long arduous quests to raise a dead party member - the only churches in town won't resurrect your dead rogue becuase he's a kinda vicious guy so you have to quest to some far away church in a far away land to find a priest who appreciates your rogue's viciousness enough to raise him.

Summary:
In order to be resurrected, you need to be fairly wealthy and fairly well connected to know someone who can cast the spell and be able to pay for the component. Otherwise death is permanent.
And you need to die a clean death with an intact recoverable corpse, or you need even more wealth and connection to pay for the bigger spells' components. Otherwise death is permanent.
If you want to live forever, you also need magic to counteract aging, or one day you'll die of old age and be beyond any hope of resurrection.
And even you can afford it and can find someone to cast the spell, you just might like your afterlife enough to refuse the resurrection even if it is cast.
Assassins who take contracts against victims who have enough wealth and connections will come prepared to capture their victim's soul to prevent resurrection.

Given all that, I don't see why we need arbritrary and silly proclamations that raising the dead requires some mystical "destiny" at all.


----------



## Donovan Morningfire (Mar 19, 2008)

robertliguori said:
			
		

> Let's wait until we see the rules for destiny.  If we see nonsense similar to the nonsense from Saga, then we can toss this into the continuing pile of DOA D&D rules across editions.
> 
> (Or, optionally, have religious ceremonies in which people ritually pledge to serve their god for some number of years and therefore have Unfinished Business if they die before their time.)
> 
> If destiny is simply something the DM assigns to characters arbitrarily ("Yeah, sorry, Bob, you have a destiny of Destruction, so you get a -2 to your attack rolls for 24 hours for resolving that border skirmish peacefully.") then this is beyond stupid.



Doesn't have much to do with raise dead, but this really irks me.

I can only assume you've done nothing more than give the Saga Edition destiny rules a passing glance at best, or are relying on second-hand knowledge considering how ill-informed this view on SWSE's Destiny Mechanics are, especially the specific example.

It's quite possible for someone with a Destruction destiny to *not* be penalized for resolving a border skirmish peacefully, and might even be rewarded for moving one step closer to their destiny if by peacefully resolving that skirmish they gain the allies needed to help them destroy the Big Evil Cult that they are destined to destroy.  Obi-Wan had a Destiny to get Luke started on the Jedi path (Education), but wasn't penalized because he withheld certain key truths from Luke (namely, his father's real fate), which by your rather literal reading of the Destiny mechanics he should have been.


----------



## billd91 (Mar 19, 2008)

Dausuul said:
			
		

> And if you got sent to the Nine Hells and are now burning in agony, you'd rather stay there, too?




Presumably, the LE bad guy knew where he was going already so it's not like there are any surprises. And yes, maybe he wants out. Recurring villains can be like that. But, if he's a major villain, he might have already made arrangements to satisfy his ambitions... and working your way up the devil chain certainly takes ambition.


----------



## DM_Blake (Mar 19, 2008)

Dausuul said:
			
		

> And if you got sent to the Nine Hells and are now burning in agony, you'd rather stay there, too?




Good people go to nice places.

Neutral people go to nice places that are different from where good people go, but very nice to the neutral person's outlook.

Evil people go to scary places, but if they served their god well in life, then they tend to be put in charge of the scary place, given some power and authority, given an afterlife that really appeals to their evil nature. 

Those roasting in the agonizing fires of the Nine Hells are those who failed their god and are being punished, or those who were evil without serving an evil god (say, a succubus came to the material plane, tricked a guy into evil deeds, then he died, all without ever choosing an evil god to serve).

But it's safe to say that nobody chooses to worship any evil god for a few dozen years if the end result is an eternity of hellfire. 

Evil gods reward their faithful followers because they want to have faithful followers.

In a D&D world where Speak With Dead, Resurrection, Planar Travel, and Scrying exist, nobody has to take anything on faith. If worshipping Hextor means eternity in hellfire, then all the worshippers will know this. Hextor cannot trick them (well, maybe the weak, simple, evil masses, but the leaders and priests will be able to use those spells and find out what their fate is going to be).

But yes, your original question was valid. If you did fail your evil god, or end up in hellfire some other way, and resurrection was offered to you, you would certainly take it. That just doesn't happen very often. The kind of evil guy who is likely to receive a resurrection is also likely to be well rewarded in the Nine Hells. The kind of evil guy who is roasting in hellfire is not very likely to receive a resurrection in the first place.


----------



## Will (Mar 19, 2008)

... You honestly think people never do things that will result in bad outcomes in the misguided sense that it won't happen to them, or it won't happen soon enough to matter?

I think RL has plenty of counter examples.


----------



## robertliguori (Mar 19, 2008)

Donovan Morningfire said:
			
		

> Doesn't have much to do with raise dead, but this really irks me.
> 
> I can only assume you've done nothing more than give the Saga Edition destiny rules a passing glance at best, or are relying on second-hand knowledge considering how ill-informed this view on SWSE's Destiny Mechanics are, especially the specific example.
> 
> It's quite possible for someone with a Destruction destiny to *not* be penalized for resolving a border skirmish peacefully, and might even be rewarded for moving one step closer to their destiny if by peacefully resolving that skirmish they gain the allies needed to help them destroy the Big Evil Cult that they are destined to destroy.  Obi-Wan had a Destiny to get Luke started on the Jedi path (Education), but wasn't penalized because he withheld certain key truths from Luke (namely, his father's real fate), which by your rather literal reading of the Destiny mechanics he should have been.




I had taken it to be implied that the Destruction destiny was of the kingdom (with the theory that a lot of border skirmishes can add to a war quickly), not in general.  If there was any confusion, then yes, destinies are specific, and a destiny of Destruction does not penalize you for random acts of non-destruction. (It does for specific acts that make your destined destruction less likely.  Worship of or even getting the attention of Erynthul or Nerull is just a bad idea.) 




> But it's safe to say that nobody chooses to worship any evil god for a few dozen years if the end result is an eternity of hellfire.
> 
> Evil gods reward their faithful followers because they want to have faithful followers.




I think that it's more likely that characters act according to their alignments, and choose their patron gods the same way.  If you are naturally chaotic neutral, you may find yourself worshipping Olidammara; if you aren't, then the odds of you doing so are less.  I don't think that outside of specific, highly-controlled areas, you get too much voluntary adoption of a god in contravention of how people would choose to be in general; I think that you get a fair number of evil people worshiping evil gods not because they expect a grand reward, but because the alternative is the tender mercies of the fiends.  (Not that most evil gods are any better, amusingly enough.)


----------



## DM_Blake (Mar 19, 2008)

robertliguori said:
			
		

> I think that it's more likely that characters act according to their alignments, and choose their patron gods the same way.  If you are naturally chaotic neutral, you may find yourself worshipping Olidammara; if you aren't, then the odds of you doing so are less.  I don't think that outside of specific, highly-controlled areas, you get too much voluntary adoption of a god in contravention of how people would choose to be in general; I think that you get a fair number of evil people worshiping evil gods not because they expect a grand reward, but because the alternative is the tender mercies of the fiends.  (Not that most evil gods are any better, amusingly enough.)




Yes, I think that's pretty much the gist of it.

However, someone who is ruthless and evil in real earth (pick your favorite historical bad guy, e.g. Hitler if you'd like) can easily rationalize that hellfire is just a myth so lets go be ruthless, take over the world, slaughter lots of people, etc.

But, in D&D, those villains know, without a doubt, can even have it scried for a few gold at a local gypsy camp, what will happen to them at the end of their life. They cannot rationalize it as a myth.

That alone would be enough to scare most of them straight. Or at least straight enough to avoid the hellfire. If Hitler lived in Greyhawk, he might very well have toned it down a bit, or found a way to latch onto some evil entity who could guarantee him a position of leadership in the afterlife rather than eternal agony.

And given that, many evil deities, entities, and even fiends would gladly take on evil followers who show promise, then reward them rather than torment them in the afterlife. If the evil entity breaks his word, he won't get many new promising recruits.

Ergo, Mr. evil assassin, necromancer, demonologist, blackguard, etc., all have patrons who promise great rewards. Evil kinds of rewards. Not playing harps on puffy clouds - these guys don't want that. They want an army to lead, a harem to, uh, you know, and a pit full of victims to torment. And their patron will gladly bribe them with this stuff, and will fulfill his promise when these guys die the final death.

Even the ones who don't pick up a patron in life, will often be recruited in death by talent scouts for the big bad afterlife entities looking to recruit generals for their eternal interplanar wars. Their death becomes a sort of a free agency...

And any evil villains running around commiting mayhem in the D&D world who haven't chose a side yet, haven't secured their eternal bliss, are taking a huge risk. And all the evil entities have armies of messengers of all types, just itching to bop up to the material plane on a recruitment drive. They send these messengers up to find evil guys just like this and tempt them with all the promises.

Sure, it doesn't always go this way. But it would surely go this way very often.

And once you get the inside track to an eternity of evil awfulness, you only end up in the hellfires if you screw it up and fail your evil patron - their punishment is truly scary.


----------



## JohnSnow (Mar 19, 2008)

DM_Blake said:
			
		

> Summary:
> In order to be resurrected, you need to be fairly wealthy and fairly well connected to know someone who can cast the spell and be able to pay for the component. Otherwise death is permanent.
> And you need to die a clean death with an intact recoverable corpse, or you need even more wealth and connection to pay for the bigger spells' components. Otherwise death is permanent.




See, the problem (such as it is) with this approach is that it just doesn't work for the kind of stories some of us want to tell or the kind of worlds we want to game in.

The notion that the rich can avoid death if they can pay the tab might be philosophically inconsistent with the kind of world we want. By insisting on an actual monetary "cost," you invalidate a number of sayings so essential to our conception of the world that the whole thing becomes irrelevant.

Many people would do anything, literally _anything_ to bring a loved one back to life. Peasants in the real world rioted over poor working conditions. You don't think it would be worse if people knew that with enough money, you could bring people back to life?!

Ask yourself: What would people do today if they found out that some company had the ability to reverse death? Anything that didn't have an expensive (read: rare) consumable would be MANDATED in order to prevent civil unrest.

Some people love to talk about "creative" solutions to the questions raised by 3e's rules, like Derren's absurd "diamond mine" scenario. And that's a creative solution to part A of the problem. But A leads to B leads to C, and so on.

The ultimate problem with the simulationist approach is that, if you think it through sufficiently, you realize that A doesn't actually solve the problem - it just raises more quesitons, which need more creative solutions, and so on. At some point, if you're honest with yourself, you are forced to admit that fully conceptualizing a world where death is as easily reversible as it is in 3e is actually impossible. It changes so much that there really is no way to have a "realistic" world based on the premise.

But if it's actually determined by factors beyond people's control, like whether it's someone's "destiny" to die now, people will gripe about it, but it's nothing they can change. And that's not so different from the real world.

But the reversal of death as a purchasable commodity that the wealthy can afford but the poor can't? That's a much thornier problem. Since it's under the control of mortals, some people would inevitably try to change it. And following the repercussions of whatever decisions you make through the whole of society...

It makes my brain hurt.


----------



## Derren (Mar 19, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> Some people love to talk about "creative" solutions to the questions raised by 3e's rules, like Derren's absurd "diamond mine" scenario.




Why is it absurd? When diamonds ensure that you can be ressurected (among other uses as spell components) then you can be sure that nobles would fight about diamond deposits a lot harder than normally and that the diamonds are a lot more valuable than when just being used as luxury item.


----------



## Will (Mar 19, 2008)

DM Blake:
Yes, you can scry the Hells (with, mind you, GREAT difficulty). So?

What proof can anyone offer you that 'if I am evil, I will definitely go THERE and be tortured'?

What, your God told you so? Maybe he's lying. In fact, maybe your 'detect evil' only tells you what your chump God wants you to think.


----------



## pukunui (Mar 19, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> See, the problem (such as it is) with this approach is that it just doesn't work for the kind of stories some of us want to tell or the kind of worlds we want to game in.
> 
> The notion that the rich can avoid death if they can pay the tab might be philosophically inconsistent with the kind of world we want. By insisting on an actual monetary "cost," you invalidate a number of sayings so essential to our conception of the world that the whole thing becomes irrelevant.
> 
> ...



This!

I really dislike the 3e assumption that all you need to access _raise dead_ et al are the right connections and the right amount of money.

Sure, I can houserule it otherwise, but the more important question is: why should I have to?
What Keith Baker has said about the 4e interpretation is much more to my liking. It makes raising people from the dead less of a service/luxury/commodity/whatever that's taken for granted by people living in the fantasy world and makes it more mysterious/magical/fantastical/whatever.


----------



## DM_Blake (Mar 19, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> See, the problem (such as it is) with this approach is that it just doesn't work for the kind of stories some of us want to tell or the kind of worlds we want to game in.
> 
> The notion that the rich can avoid death if they can pay the tab might be philosophically inconsistent with the kind of world we want. By insisting on an actual monetary "cost," you invalidate a number of sayings so essential to our conception of the world that the whole thing becomes irrelevant.
> 
> ...




Yes, but now you get to the fun part. The farmer holding the archbishop at scythe-point to force him to raise his beloved wife. Nice story hook.

The overzealous church ruling the land with an iron hand, even kings bowing to their whim because they don't want that precious resurrection withheld because they crossed the church. Nice campaign hook, or at least backstory.

Or the barmaid who begs the party's cleric for a raise dead, and offers them a magical sword worth more than the cost of a diamond. Now they need to get the diamond - none available in this little town. Or do they use the one the cleric was saving for an emergency? I hope they won't need a raise dead in the dungeon now... And what if that sword was stolen, something they find out, the hard way, a week later?

Do you need these hooks? No, there's a million more hooks out there that don't involve raising the dead.

Ultimately, precious precious diamonds are too far out of the reach of 95% of the masses that they just accept death because they can't change it, except for the rare few who try to take the law into their own hands and steal diamonds or the coin to buy them, or coerce priests to cast the spell. Maybe some of them make dark pacts, or even light pacts, for a resurrection.

4% of the population doesn't have the means to get a raise dead, but at least they might have a shot. They are merchants, business owners, poor noblemen with little viable land or income. They don't have enough, but they know people who do, and maybe can barter for allegiance or services or ownership of their business, etc. Buying a raise dead could seriously ruin these people, but they might be desperate enough to do what it takes, even if that means breaking the law to make up their shortage.

1% of the population might have the cash on hand, or the means enough to get it, or eventually get it if they can arrange a little loan for the time being. These people are the upper crust of society. Instead of driving around in Rolls Royces and shopping at Tiffany's, they flaunt their near immortality as one of the privileges of the elite.

I'm not saying a game world has to work this way. But I am saying that an arbitrary, heavy-handed rule that says "nope, you cant be raised because you have no destiny" is not necessary either. Why not just leave it up to the individual campaign world or the individual DM to decide this stuff?

Where does it make more sense that "Well, we've resurrected Fred 47 times because he's a reckless adventurer with spare coin and an unfulfilled destiny, but we can't resurrect the high priest of Ziggy or the king of Muckamuck because, well, they never had a destiny to fulfill."

So, I respect that some of us want to tell a story where resurrection is a precious, destiny-driven privilege, and others want to tell a story where resurrection is nothing more than a luxurious commodity.

What I don't understand is why we must have a rule to tell us which one to use.


----------



## JohnSnow (Mar 19, 2008)

Derren said:
			
		

> Why is it absurd? When diamonds ensure that you can be ressurected (among other uses as spell components) then you can be sure that nobles would fight about diamond deposits a lot harder than normally and that the diamonds are a lot more valuable than when just being used as luxury item.




Sure. Your assumption is fine _as far as it goes_.

As a matter of fact, it's not only _fine_ but an _inherent truth_ derived from combining human nature with the ruleset. But that's not really that creative, since it not only MIGHT happen, it WOULD happen. So every world with ready resurrection spells that require diamonds has nobles feuding over diamond mines.

Moreover, it raises many, many questions that you don't answer. And those are questions that, pursued logically, will fundamentally alter the world to the point where it's unrecognizable.

Why wouldn't the peasants rise up en masse to take over those diamond deposits?

Who mines the diamonds?

In the real world, diamonds are most common in tropical locales, like africa and south america (it has to do with dead dinosaurs). How does this relate to the assumed pseudo-medieval setting?

Why would the poor labor?

How do you feel about a world where the gap between rich and poor is so vast?

In the real world, a poor man can be smarter or luckier than his social superiors. Likewise, a king can die of the plague. And no matter how rich you are, "you can't take it with you."

Do you want to game in a world where the saying is "Nothing in life is certain except taxes?"


----------



## Derren (Mar 19, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> Moreover, it raises many, many questions that you don't answer. And those are questions that, pursued logically, will fundamentally alter the world to the point where it's unrecognizable.




It wasn't my intention to explain such adapted worlds fully, but if you insist...







> Why wouldn't the peasants rise up en masse to take over those diamond deposits?



Why would they? Sure if the pesants rebel then those mines are a nice target but in the end it wouldn't do the pesants much good. Their rebellion will likely be squashed and the only thing they can do is collapsing the mine, but they can't really destroy the diamonds or use them unless a church supports them.







> Who mines the diamonds?




Pesants. Why shouldn't they?







> In the real world, diamonds are most common in tropical locales, like africa and south america (it has to do with dead dinosaurs). How does this relate to the assumed pseudo-medieval setting?




Where diamonds can be found depends on the setting.







> Why would the poor labor?




Why did the poor labor in any feudal system? Its their job and if they don't do it they will be killed or loose everything and are left to starve.







> How do you feel about a world where the gap between rich and poor is so vast?




I think such a world is interesting as it doesn't look like mediveal europe with magic tacked on. Thats a general problem with D&D settings, magic is a addition but doesn't really affect the society. Of course my proposed solution is not for people who want a traditional mediveal world, no matter how unlogical that is.
Also, the gap isn't that much wider than in real life. Most nobles and rich persons already lived longer because they could afford to pay doctors except when things like the plague happened.







> In the real world, a poor man can be smarter or luckier than his social superiors. Likewise, a king can die of the plague. And no matter how rich you are, "you can't take it with you."
> 
> Do you want to game in a world where the saying is "Nothing in life is certain except taxes?"




Why not? And old age still kills nobles (unless drastic measures are taken). I am rather surprised why you only pick those pesant <-> noble examples as imo the whole ressurection issue as pesants wouldn't be really affected by ressurection at all. They might be a bit more disgruntled because than in reality because nobles can't die early but thats all. The real differences would be in politics and warefare.


----------



## BryonD (Mar 19, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> The ultimate problem with the simulationist approach is that, if you think it through sufficiently, you realize that A doesn't actually solve the problem - it just raises more quesitons, which need more creative solutions, and so on.



Isn't it fun to just make up crap about someone else's position and declare it flawed based on your own smear!!!!!



> It makes my brain hurt.



My brain handles it just fine.


----------



## Will (Mar 19, 2008)

DM_Blake said:
			
		

> What I don't understand is why we must have a rule to tell us which one to use.




Well, effectively, the rule was one way before, now it's a different way. People could houserule it before, and I suppose if you are really set against this rule you can houserule it again. Which kind of sucks if you prefer it that way.

But, well, for my part? Yay!


----------



## JohnSnow (Mar 19, 2008)

Derren said:
			
		

> The real differences would be in politics and warefare.




No, the real differences are so vast as to be incomprehensible.

The "destiny" (or "most people just don't come back") explanation actually preserves verisimilitude for anyone who's willing to take more than a surface look at what the possibility of raising the dead would change about society.

D&D's four levels of dead is twice as many as exist in _The Princess Bride_, which, I feel the need to point out, is a comedy.

1) "Fortunately, your friend here is only dead. We should be able to bring him back, but he'll be weak for a while." (Raise Dead)

2) "Sorry, your friend's not just dead, he's very dead. That spell we used last time won't cut it - you need a more powerful spell to bring him back." (Resurrection)

3) "Oooo...your friend's not just very dead, he's extremely dead. Oooo...that's gonna cost ya." (True Resurrection)

4) "Sorry. He's all dead. Guess all we can do is go through his pockets and look for loose change." (And this really is what most people call "dead.")

Even Billy Crystal couldn't make this funny.

It changes politics, war, inheritance law, economics, the social order, religion, and I can't even imagine what else. Trying to apply logic to fantasy is, IMO, a mostly fruitless exercise.


----------



## JohnSnow (Mar 19, 2008)

BryonD said:
			
		

> Isn't it fun to just make up crap about someone else's position and declare it flawed based on your own smear!!!!!
> 
> 
> My brain handles it just fine.




Fine. Explain to me how death and resurrection works in your world. Provide detailed alterations to the socio-economic and historical events based on the notion that death is no longer permanent.

One logical hole and you lose.

Best of luck.


----------



## Revinor (Mar 19, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> In the real world, diamonds are most common in tropical locales, like africa and south america (it has to do with dead dinosaurs).




You mean that dead dinosaurs are not eating diamonds, so they can be found? I fail to see any other relation, given that most diamonds are 1-3 billion years old, while dinosaurs (dead or alive) are considerably younger.

I think that you are confusing diamonds with petroleum. Petroleum is also not made from dinosaurs, but at least one of the theories claims it is some kind of dead plants related.

Or maybe amber? It is sap from the trees, for sure organic related.


----------



## Revinor (Mar 19, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> Fine. Explain to me how death and resurrection works in your world. Provide detailed alterations to the socio-economic and historical events based on the notion that death is no longer permanent.
> 
> One logical hole and you lose.




Take history/social set of ANY setting and we will find some logical holes, regardless of raise dead being there or not. I suppose that even taking Earth history in short form would produce a lot of logical holes. Most of second world war is made from logical holes.

One example of the setting with non-permanent death is presented in  Takeshi Kovacs novels from Richard Morgan. It is SF setting, but with feudal-like culture in many aspects. Basically, in this world, you were able to make a full copy of mind of a person and then put it back in any body. In addition to stationary scans, everybody had a backup unit implanted in head, which was very resilient and providing latest updates in case of death. Killing person was not a serious crime (more of financial aspect of new body), destroying his/her backup unit was capital offense. Travel between stars was achieved by transferring data of person into body waiting on the other side. 

There was a LOT of effects on the setting caused by lack of permadeath and ease of switching bodies - it was one of defining factors of it. While you could argue about few aspects of society as presented, it was still very consistent and well thought.

I don't see a big problem with coming up with fantasy equivalent of it.

P.S.
If you have not read the novels and you are not allergic to SF, please do read them - I have enjoyed the story a lot. Concept of Envoys is really nice solution to interplanetary conflicts.


----------



## robertliguori (Mar 20, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> Fine. Explain to me how death and resurrection works in your world. Provide detailed alterations to the socio-economic and historical events based on the notion that death is no longer permanent.
> 
> One logical hole and you lose.
> 
> Best of luck.




'Kay.  

Characters of 6th level and above are trans-economic, and so rare in the campaign setting that most people live their lives without meeting one.  Even then, heroes who set out to change the world deliberately are unknown-up-until-now; if there are characters selling spell-casting above  fourth level, it's the PCs doing the selling, with individual effects to adjudicate.

This, needless to say, involves ignoring the projected NPCs by population tables.

Of course, there is already a huge-ass gap between "Mythic fates and unknowable gods" and what we've seen of 4E (again, you can kill gods and take their stuff), so the goalposts are not on perfect, they're on "Better than having to explain from the perspective of a Fate why they chose to make the world a particular way, when a poor explanation will result in a PC finishing murdering them."  This is why hanging mechanics of the universe on the decisions of in-universe NPCs is rarely a good idea for stability and sanity.


----------



## hong (Mar 20, 2008)

robertliguori said:
			
		

> 'Kay.
> 
> Characters of 6th level and above are trans-economic, and so rare in the campaign setting that most people live their lives without meeting one.  Even then, heroes who set out to change the world deliberately are unknown-up-until-now; if there are characters selling spell-casting above  fourth level, it's the PCs doing the selling, with individual effects to adjudicate.




So... you integrate these characters into the economic and social fabric of your game world, by putting them outside said fabric?

That's what I've been doing all along!


----------



## Stogoe (Mar 20, 2008)

DM_Blake said:
			
		

> So, I respect that some of us want to tell a story where resurrection is a precious, destiny-driven privilege, and others want to tell a story where resurrection is nothing more than a luxurious commodity.
> 
> What I don't understand is why we must have a rule to tell us which one to use.




Welcome to the other side of the fence; the side where the game doesn't cater to your every whim and you might have to houserule something, or several somethings.  We've lived with the Immortal Oligarchy rez-rule for multiple editions, and we've had to tweak it/throw it out wholesale to make the game work for us.

You'll get used to it; we did.


----------



## Lurker37 (Mar 20, 2008)

Dausuul said:
			
		

> And if you got sent to the Nine Hells and are now burning in agony, you'd rather stay there, too?




Doesn't happen any more, according to worlds and monsters. The Dead go to the Shadowfell, and those without the destiny or sheer will to keep them there quickly move on. The majority go to parts unknown, but some _choose_ to enter the service of a god. The latter could conceivably be tracked down, allowing for them to be resurrected if you can persuade them to return. No-one, however, ends up in a heaven or hell anymore, at least not one that can be reached by planar travel. Where the majority of dead souls go is a mystery.

So there's already adventure hooks built into the new 4E afterlife concept. Most of the time, your first stop will be the Shadowfell.

And to repeat what others have said - it's much, MUCH better for nearly every plot line a DM can conceive to have resurrection of the dead be an exception rather than the rule. Certainly the vast, *vast* majority of fantasy and sword and sorcery fiction most of us have in mind when planning a campaign or character makes this assumption. How is having an in-game explanation of what 99% of us were doing in their campaigns anyway bad for simulation? 

Answer: For most of us, it isn't.


----------



## Cergorach (Mar 20, 2008)

When I read this news yesterday on the frontpage, I actually thought "This is the last straw, I'm going to rewrite 3.5E and I'll go my own way!", then I come across the whole Pathfinder RPG OGL thing and someone beat me to it ;-)

I really hate the idea of making characters have an actual destiny, I'm sure some of my (former) players hate this idea as well. It 'forces' you to play a certain type of character, it makes you special beyond your abilities, it makes you a different species and sets you apart from society. Next thing we know we'll have Detect Destiny spells, they finally stopped using the whole Good/Evil thing and now they come up with this! It's just an easy way out!

Raise Dead is a 5th Level spell, requires a 9th Level Cleric, and the material components are 5,000gp. The cost of 'buying' a Raise Dead spell is going fall outside the budget of 95% of the population. Leaving only those Rich enough to afford it and in good graces with someone who can cast it. A good church isn't gooing to raise a slum lord, an evil church isn't going to raise a paladin. The spell reuires you to have the body, no body, No Raise Dead. Thus dying in a large fire or being eaten by wild animals still leaves you with a problem. Young folks die of heart attack all the time (it's not common, but also not super rare), I would say that falls under 'old age'. Then we come to the good parts, rich people have lots of enemies and generally those that hire professionals to solve problems. A missing head or no heart is going to rain on your Raise Dead spell and easily done by most thugs, spells with death effects are for the higher paid assassins.

Next comes Ressurrection, that's a 7th Level spell, requiring a 13th Level Cleric to cast. Those are quite rare, but that still leaves 'old age' as a killer that you can't be saved from (heart attack!). It wouldn't be farfetched that certain Assassin guilds have an understanding with the clerigy "You start Ressurrecting our victims and we'll murder every highly placed (13th+ Level) Priest of your church in the vacinity!". Not to mention that kidnapping and imprisonment is now a better tactic then murder, there are places under the city were folks like Jimmy Hoffa are kept (alive). We also have Spells like Trap the Soul that make sure that a soul is trapped somewhere else.

That is from the top of my head, and there are many roleplaying ideas in there for adventure.


----------



## HeinorNY (Mar 20, 2008)

Cergorach said:
			
		

> I really hate the idea of making characters have an actual destiny, I'm sure some of my (former) players hate this idea as well.



It reminded me of the Simulationist's Manifesto:

"We don't need special metagame rules to make our characters heroes, cheats are for cheaters. Just give me the same tools that everyone else gets, let me perfect them using my own effort and I'll show what heroism is all about. We don't need "Destiny" points to artificially create memorable moments, or even to save our skin. If we die, we die. Life is cruel and sht happens, but when we manage to achieve something truly important, something that really makes a difference to the world, it's gonna be memorable because it was "real", not fabricated by cinematic rules.
In Simulationist gaming, heroism does not dictate actions. Actions dictate heroism. Heroes are made with choices, hard work, bravery and a bit of luck. We forge our destiny instead of being carried by it. Our characters make history instead of being made by the story."


----------



## Lurker37 (Mar 20, 2008)

One point worth noting - we know almost _nothing_ about how destinies are handled in 4E. 

None of the sample characters from DDXP had a Destiny entry on their character sheet, but that could have been a deliberate omission to keep the introduction simple. Or, as previously speculated, it could be that PCs do not earn any significant destiny until higher levels. So it really doesn't prove anything one way or the other.

The possibilities range from "Well, you were able to be resurrected, so obviously the universe isn't finished with you yet - I wonder why?" all the way through to "I'll get you next time, Nemesis McNasty! It's my destiny to kill you"

It's entirely possible that destinies have no presence in game other than as fluff to explain why not everyone can get resurrected. That they are both unknown to those having them and bereft of any game mechanic other than making resurrection possible.

As for the other barriers to raise dead and the plot hooks they can provide - there's no indication that they are not still in game. And as I said, this change seems to have been designed to add plot hooks, not remove them.

In short, until we know more, it's too soon to be getting upset.


----------



## Mephistopheles (Mar 20, 2008)

My idea of a simulationist approach to things that don't exist in the real world is that you run a bit of a thought experiment to see how things from a real world perspective would change if it were possible. So with the examples of monarchs you start with the premise that monarchs can arrange to be brought back from the dead and ask things like i) What measures would monarchs take to have themselves brought back? ii) What measures would other parties take to prevent the monarch being brought back if it is in their interest for the monarch to stay dead? iii) What measures would need to be taken in trying to assassinate a monarch or usurp a throne when the aggressors know that the monarch likely has measures in place to be brought back?, iv) What kind of impact on laws and economics are caused by the reagents that are required to work the magic to bring someone back from the dead (eg/ diamonds become contraband for anyone but the nobility, and so on), v) How powerful are religious organizations when monarchs or nobles will rely on them to carry through with having them brought back from the dead?, etc. It's a fun but time consuming process if you're trying to do that for everything that would have this sort of impact.

What Keith has said they've done in 4E with resurrection magic is neither for nor against a simulationist approach, it simply changes the thing being simulated. It is a nice short cut around having to explain how these things affect a world or why they don't, so it makes approaching it from a simulationist perspective much easier because it's more narrowly focused. I would prefer they keep this as an option in the DMG but the change does seem to be true to their stated goal of making things easier for DMs. I've played in a few games in previous editions where the DMs took this kind of approach to things like resurrection magic and it was fine in the context of their games.

It will mean more work for religious organizations, though. They'll have to start up destiny insurance departments with priests who go around trying to raise everyone who dies to be sure there wasn't some unsettled destiny their deity had planned for them.


----------



## Cergorach (Mar 20, 2008)

ainatan said:
			
		

> It reminded me of the Simulationist's Manifesto:
> 
> "We don't need special metagame rules to make our characters heroes, cheats are for cheaters. Just give me the same tools that everyone else gets, let me perfect them using my own effort and I'll show what heroism is all about. We don't need "Destiny" points to artificially create memorable moments, or even to save our skin. If we die, we die. Life is cruel and sht happens, but when we manage to achieve something truly important, something that really makes a difference to the world, it's gonna be memorable because it was "real", not fabricated by cinematic rules.
> In Simulationist gaming, heroism does not dictate actions. Actions dictate heroism. Heroes are made with choices, hard work, bravery and a bit of luck. We forge our destiny instead of being carried by it. Our characters make history instead of being made by the story."



I can actually find myself in that statement, but saying that I'm a Simulationist, I don't like. It would mean I'm part of a group *makes cross to ward off group people* ;-)

I actually like the mechanic of Action dice, Karma, and Luck points. Because it lets the player influences the outcome of an action the character is making for dramatic effect. The problem I have with this change is that it's not a mechanical rule, it's a dramatic change on how the 'D&D' universe works. It creates the impression that the only 'real' people in the D&D world are those with Destiny, everything else are just cardboard props there for the benefit and entertainment of those that matter in the eyes of Destiny. I'm of course not opposed to the idea of destiny, but i like it as a story device that is used on a very rare occassion, and not on scores of villains and other heroes the characters/players will meet.


----------



## Celebrim (Mar 20, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> Many people would do anything, literally _anything_ to bring a loved one back to life. Peasants in the real world rioted over poor working conditions. You don't think it would be worse if people knew that with enough money, you could bring people back to life?!




Which on the other hand is exactly the sort of story that I'm interested in telling.

For example, there is a confederation of small princedoms on my homebrew where politics are dominated by the fact that certain wealthy families know the secret of eternal life and can manufacture potions of longevity.  I want to address interesting questions like, 'What would it be like if your life expectancy was directly related to your income?'  What if ruling families went on ruling for centuries?  What if you ruler was the same as your great-great-grandfathers ruler?  Would the peasants be only envious?  Or would some of them be in awe?  What happens when that social stability is taken away?

That's precisely the sort of interesting question that you can address in fantasy.  Even if ultimately such ideas serve as little more than window dressing for your world, and the adventure can procede just fine without them, I think having that sort of thing be part of the story greatly enriches it.  

If realism was really my first priority, then I wouldn't use a fantasy setting at all.  



> But the reversal of death as a purchasable commodity that the wealthy can afford but the poor can't? That's a much thornier problem. Since it's under the control of mortals, some people would inevitably try to change it. And following the repercussions of whatever decisions you make through the whole of society...
> 
> It makes my brain hurt.




Yes, but that's part of the fun.


----------



## Lackhand (Mar 20, 2008)

So, here's what I'm missing. For everyone who says "No, this rule about needing destinies to be resurrected, it is all bunkum and badness!" -- for any individual example you have where being resurrected would be interesting to the plot and worth pursuing, it is obvious that the dead individual still has a destiny to pursue.

Badabing, badabang, done. This rule is in no way in your way, ever. Whenever it looks like it's in your way, it gets out of the way, because it's really very accommodating that way.

However, in the case where resurrection is silly/would reshape society (in a way the DM doesn't wish to deal with)/destroys your campaign, you actually have an excuse to prevent this negative occurrence, other than economics and recalcitrant ghosts.

Sure, 5,000 gp is out of the price range of your average yokel. But it's _not_ out of reach for any given community of reasonable size, and especially not of any modestly successful noble. This means that each and every campaign world had to somehow explain away death for a large amount of its on-screen characters, or just hope nobody looked too closely.

So, needless to say, I like this.


----------



## VannATLC (Mar 20, 2008)

ainatan said:
			
		

> It reminded me of the Simulationist's Manifesto:
> 
> "We don't need special metagame rules to make our characters heroes, cheats are for cheaters. Just give me the same tools that everyone else gets, let me perfect them using my own effort and I'll show what heroism is all about. We don't need "Destiny" points to artificially create memorable moments, or even to save our skin. If we die, we die. Life is cruel and sht happens, but when we manage to achieve something truly important, something that really makes a difference to the world, it's gonna be memorable because it was "real", not fabricated by cinematic rules.
> In Simulationist gaming, heroism does not dictate actions. Actions dictate heroism. Heroes are made with choices, hard work, bravery and a bit of luck. We forge our destiny instead of being carried by it. Our characters make history instead of being made by the story."




How do you justify an story or an adventure hook? How do you actually say "I'm normal"

Are people like (Godwinned!) Hitler, or Idi Amin, or Martin Luther King, or Gandhi or Columbus, or Cook, or Cortez, or Richard Branson, or Bill Gates, are normal?

Do you think, I mean, you personally, think that anybody in their shoes would have done as well?

Because I don't. And I think a PC in a RPG reflects the essence that some people are 'different' than others. They can utilize it to great personal gain, inflict the depredations of their success upon thousands, they can benefit many. They can coast along, maximising their gain, minimising their negative impacts. 

Most people, most NPCs, are sheep. The PCs (And in most cases, the players, for a variety of reasons) are not.


EDIT: WRT to the OP..

As the above, I think people do or do not have what it takes to be great. I think there is a spark, genetic, maybe, who knows? That is worked upon by the environs they are raised in. sometimes it fades out. Sometimes it fans into life. When it does? The strength of will, to be who they are, to be different and great? That is what I interprete as 'Destiny'
Somebody who will not easily bend to fate. Somebody who has the strength of soul to resist the pull of the Raven Queen, and whatever lies beyond her. They are the people you can bring back.

By defination, PCs and important NPC's are that kind of person. I would, it is true, concede that any King via conquest, or other forms of 'merit' (loosely used, thank you.) would also be that kind of person.

Certainly how I will run it in my campaigns, and generally already have.


----------



## robertliguori (Mar 20, 2008)

VannATLC said:
			
		

> How do you justify an story or an adventure hook? How do you actually say "I'm normal"
> 
> Are people like (Godwinned!) Hitler, or Idi Amin, or Martin Luther King, or Gandhi or Columbus, or Cook, or Cortez, or Richard Branson, or Bill Gates, are normal?
> 
> ...



In order:
To simulationists, the story is what happens.  Sometimes, the story is the story of The Adventurers Who Hung Out In A Tavern While A Mystery Happened To Someone Else.  Sometimes, it's The Adventurers Who Got Ambushed and Died In Their Second Random Encounter.

As for your list of people, there is a large amount of difference between exceptional and different.  Simulationist adventuring would hold that if you substituted someone with comparable desires and abilities into Bill Gate's life at the important points, you'd have a good shot of getting another Bill Gates.  What makes the people on this list special is not that their natures were qualitatively different than humanity; it was their choices, and their actions.

Because, when you start to look at the closely-detailed bits of history, you start noticing that people are pretty much people, and that not only do heroes and villains both have their human sides, but there are veritable loads of people just as heroic and villainous who failed and were forgotten.  I think that most people choose not to attempt great things, but those who do choose only buy themselves the chance of success by their decision, and those that do not can always choose differently.  To the simulationists, the difference between Bilbo and Frodo Baggins was not their protagonist status, or their elven heritage, or the fact that Eru hand-designed their souls to be adventure-capable; it was that they chose to leave the Shire.  Choice, not inherent characteristics, makes heroes heroes.


----------



## VannATLC (Mar 20, 2008)

I understand where you are coming from, but I think you miss part of what I'm trying to say, mostly likely because I'm not saying it well.

What enables choice? Why do some chose other ways? 

You'll get no arguement, from me, that it is the decision to branch out and try. The strength of will required to carry out a decision. 
But that, in and of itself, is the key point.

As for the original counterpoint.
The adventures who hang out in a tavern? Why are you modelling that with DnD? I mean, it will do a passable job, but then you're applying a framework over something that doesn't need it.

Surely the point of DND is to enable the character actors, the players, to model actions they are incapable of in real life?

After all, if you could do it, why wouldn't you?
Thats not tongue in cheek. I'm utterly serious.


----------



## billd91 (Mar 20, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> Why wouldn't the peasants rise up en masse to take over those diamond deposits?




If you think this is likely, you overestimate the unity and effectiveness of peasants and their revolts. Historically, peasants couldn't often rebel to take something as ubiquitous as arable land much less diamond mines without being slaughtered.


----------



## Fallen Seraph (Mar 20, 2008)

I think though when they know it could mean potentially bringing loved one's who are on the death-bed from working in the mines back to life. A revolt could get quite united.


----------



## Will (Mar 20, 2008)

FS:
Peasants have fought quite specifically for the lives and security of their children and themselves. 

I don't know how much more motivated you can get than that. They still got slaughtered.


----------



## Fallen Seraph (Mar 20, 2008)

Yeah, but when you combine that with the ability to come back from the dead... Now that is strong motivation. I imagine too, that the peasants if they managed to take control of a diamond could put a choke-hold on the Kingdom (I imagine with a over-abundance of_ raise dead_, nobility and higher-class would get addicted to it. Which would cause them to be desperate giving peasants a better position).


----------



## Derren (Mar 20, 2008)

Fallen Seraph said:
			
		

> Yeah, but when you combine that with the ability to come back from the dead... Now that is strong motivation. I imagine too, that the peasants if they managed to take control of a diamond could put a choke-hold on the Kingdom (I imagine with a over-abundance of_ raise dead_, nobility and higher-class would get addicted to it. Which would cause them to be desperate giving peasants a better position).




Why would the control of a single diamond change something? You still need a caster to ressurect someone. No the nobles would send in the army, slaughter all the peasants and repopulate the area with people from elsewhere. They certainly won't be addicted to ressurection in a way that they are careless. They can still die permanently when no one ressurects them or their bodies become more damaged than what the lower spells can handle. Also they are still weakened by the spell and it is quite costly.

The chance that the peasants actually capture the mine is very slim as it will be guarded. And even if they do it wouldn't do them any good. Before they all die they might be able to collapse the mine but the nobles will have their own private reserve of diamonds and wouldn't be affected by this temporary disruption unless its a war or something.
No, ressurection wouldn't change that much for a peasant directly.


----------



## Fallen Seraph (Mar 20, 2008)

Well actually know that I think about it, that is a good thing with the new concept.

Resurrection can mean something for the peasantry, just imagine that through the act of resurrection a peasant comes to find he/she goes on to change things, become something more.

Also another reason, why I dislike having resurrection the old-way is what do you do, if you want to play poor-characters. Most of my games/players we play as if we can barely make by; sleeping in barns, stealing food, etc. Going to a cleric and paying for _raise dead_ is well beyond our means.


----------



## Derren (Mar 20, 2008)

Fallen Seraph said:
			
		

> Also another reason, why I dislike having resurrection the old-way is what do you do, if you want to play poor-characters. Most of my games/players we play as if we can barely make by; sleeping in barns, stealing food, etc. Going to a cleric and paying for _raise dead_ is well beyond our means.




If you want to play a poor character then you have to accept the disadvantages of being poor which includes no magical gear, bad equipment in general, less social standing and options (no bribes, etc.) and no raise dead.

I am always perplexed by people who want to play a character with a disadvantage (poor, blind, ...) but don't really want that this disadvantage affects the character (the poor can afford everything the normal adventurers have, the blind one can see like normal because of blindsight, etc.) If you want to play a poor character then play a poor character and not a wealthy character with the word "poor" written on the character sheet.


----------



## Fallen Seraph (Mar 20, 2008)

Derren said:
			
		

> If you want to play a poor character then you have to accept the disadvantages of being poor which includes no magical gear, bad equipment in general, less social standing and options (no bribes, etc.) and no raise dead.




Or I can use the new concept, and actually make the characters seem more special and unique beyond their wealth.


----------



## Derren (Mar 20, 2008)

Fallen Seraph said:
			
		

> Or I can use the new concept, and actually make the characters seem more special and unique beyond their wealth.




And why can't you do that with the old concept? Because you are actually disadvantaged by having a disadvantage? How can a poor character be special and unique when he has the same options than everyone else?


----------



## Fallen Seraph (Mar 20, 2008)

Since it is based less around disadvantages and more about the stories and characters.

I don't want my players who are going to fundamentally alter the whole campaign-world feel like, "oh yes... Well you see, since your dead thats it. But oh yes, that rich noble snob there, yeah he has a fetish for being killed and brought back to life by his high-payed clerics."

Yes my characters(players) are going to face more hardships then someone with money, but why should something like death and resurrection which really has no relation to money, wealth or power and is much more a mystical and life-altering thing be left to paying a cleric tons of money at a temple to be brought back.

I guess it comes down to different strokes for different folk, and this new concept is my kind of stroke.


----------



## hong (Mar 20, 2008)

Derren said:
			
		

> And why can't you do that with the old concept? Because you are actually disadvantaged by having a disadvantage?




"Poor" in this context is not a disadvantage, O refugee from GURPS. "Poor" is a defining aspect of a character concept. Whether or not it becomes a disadvantage in play depends on the specifics of the campaign.


----------



## Kishin (Mar 20, 2008)

Its just fluff.

Fluff can be changed.

Agents of WoTC will not stuff you into a black van, never to be seen again, if you ignore this insignificant little line about requiring 'destiny' to be resurrected. For those who want to use it, its convenient. For those who don't, just whistle and pretend it never was written (Trust me, its not that hard. I do it ever day with the Highlander franchise past the first movie).

Its not like you decided to completely change a mechanical concept of the game,  like ability score function.


----------



## Derren (Mar 20, 2008)

hong said:
			
		

> "Poor" in this context is not a disadvantage, O refugee from GURPS. "Poor" is a defining aspect of a character concept. Whether or not it becomes a disadvantage in play depends on the specifics of the campaign.




But how can "poor" being a defined aspect when it doesn't affect the character at all.
It sounds to me that you want all the perks (or role playing stigmata) but none of the disadvantages of being poor. To me this is silly. If you want to play a poor character then play a poor character with advantages and disadvantages this has.


----------



## VannATLC (Mar 20, 2008)

No 2nd level dnd character is poor.

It is not possible within the framework of any of the adventures.

If you want to play a character under a vow of poverty, thats different.. but even then, you're still allowed, under the old-school paladin rules  to buy supplies and armour, etc.


----------



## Fenes (Mar 20, 2008)

The game assumes you have the expected wealth per level, and access to raise dead. Playing a poor character thats till can adventure means adapting things so the character has still access to gear and other neccessities for adventuring.


----------



## VannATLC (Mar 20, 2008)

Also..

In the above examples, for a revolt, the peasents should be attacking the clergy. Even a level 9 cleric will fall to a peasent army. It would take less than the mines.


----------



## D.Shaffer (Mar 20, 2008)

*shrug* Houserule it to 'Only those with action points can be resurrected' if you want something on the character sheet if you really want a 'binary switch' as to whether they can be resurrected or not.   If you want it available to everyone, make it available to everyone.

I seriously dont see why this seems like such a game breaker to so many people.  It doesnt appear like it's that crucial a part of the design considering the implication you're not going to see it done before 10th anyways.


----------



## Celebrim (Mar 20, 2008)

robertliguori said:
			
		

> In order:
> To simulationists, the story is what happens.  Sometimes, the story is the story of The Adventurers Who Hung Out In A Tavern While A Mystery Happened To Someone Else.  Sometimes, it's The Adventurers Who Got Ambushed and Died In Their Second Random Encounter.
> 
> As for your list of people, there is a large amount of difference between exceptional and different.  Simulationist adventuring would hold that if you substituted someone with comparable desires and abilities into Bill Gate's life at the important points, you'd have a good shot of getting another Bill Gates.  What makes the people on this list special is not that their natures were qualitatively different than humanity; it was their choices, and their actions.
> ...




I agree with all of this, albiet that even simulationists stack the dice a little by make the PC's 'above average' and 'at the wrong place at the wrong time'.  



> To the simulationists, the difference between Bilbo and Frodo Baggins was not their protagonist status, or their elven heritage, or the fact that Eru hand-designed their souls to be adventure-capable; it was that they chose to leave the Shire.  Choice, not inherent characteristics, makes heroes heroes.




Agreed, but your point is somewhat undermined by the fact that there is good evidence that Eru did hand design Frodo's soul to be capable of the task.  Nonetheless, potentially a hero is not the same as a hero, and a hero is what a hero does - even when you aren't the 'best Hobbit in the Shire'.


----------



## WayneLigon (Mar 20, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> How do you feel about a world where the gap between rich and poor is so vast?
> 
> In the real world, a poor man can be smarter or luckier than his social superiors. Likewise, a king can die of the plague. And no matter how rich you are, "you can't take it with you."
> 
> Do you want to game in a world where the saying is "Nothing in life is certain except taxes?"




I don't think that the situation is so different from our real world. In the real world, there are all sorts of medical treatments that you can only get if you're wealthy. I don't see the poor besieging advanced medical centers. When - not if - we get around to things like braintaping and cloned bodies you can be sure that the factory worker pulling down his 25K ain't gonna be one of the people living forever and being ressurected from yesterday's backup when his car wipes out at 300 mph. Also, in a way he _will _ be 'taking it with him' since he won't be going anywhere.

In our D&D fantasy world, I think it's likely that the peasents don't even really know such magic exists and even if they do they probably can't comprehend it. They're probably just told that 'the gods' brought back the king or whatever. And as far as they are concerned, that's absolutely correct. 

You know, the diamonds question really doesn't matter. By the time you have people tossing around _Raise Dead _ you're certain to have in your employ someone with _Fabricate_, AKA 'Horse Poop to Diamonds'. They don't have to be _good _ diamonds, just 5000gp worth of them. A small chest of pale yellow gravel works just as well as a flawless blue-white.


----------



## WayneLigon (Mar 20, 2008)

VannATLC said:
			
		

> In the above examples, for a revolt, the peasents should be attacking the clergy. Even a level 9 cleric will fall to a peasent army. It would take less than the mines.




"Sir, we, um, _killed _ the person who could cast the spell.."

"Umm, so let me get this straight, you got all happy and cut off the head of the only person that can bring back the dead within a 50 mile radius. OK, OK, we can handle this..."

The revolt stuff works all well and good when you're trying to capture a castle or grain silo or iron mine or whatever.. but what you want is a spellcaster. You can hold him hostage to do the spell and that'll probably work for a short time. You have to leave him hale and hearty, though, to be able to cast the spell which means he also has access to all the _other _ spells he could cast. Instead of Raise Dead, he prepares Lesser Planar Ally, summons a Janni and plane shifts out of prison.


----------



## Celebrim (Mar 20, 2008)

One thing many of the critics of societies in which the rich live for ever and can be raised from the dead are forgetting, is that we are also dealing with a society where everyone can get tangible evidence of an afterlife.  Everyone is going to live forever in some form.  It's just a question of where.

A very serious question in such a universe is, "Why would anyone want to live (here) forever?"

Your average peasant certainly doesn't want to.  His life is tough.  He wants to live "well" according to his beliefs about what that is, and then go to a "better place".  Granted, the "better place" is not absolutely better.  We shouldn't presume Christian assumptions about the afterlife.  But neither necessarily need we presume everyone who isn't a hero goes to a dreery Greek Hades.   Of course, if we did assume non-heroes went to a dreery greek Hades, that would answer the question of why would anyone want to live here forever pretty definitively.


----------



## Geron Raveneye (Mar 20, 2008)

No idea if it has been mentioned inbetween in this pretty interesting discussion, but if I was looking for a version of _Raise Dead_ that caused less problems, and was "believable" enough still, I'd look at the way the Iron Kingdoms setting handles it.

- _Raise Dead_ is a 9th level spell, no other way to get someone back from the dead (except _Reincarnation_)
- The chance that a cleric of one of the gods will raise you depends on the god and church he belongs to, your level, your own patron god, and maybe even if the god in question doesn't think he/she needs your soul more in the afterlife right now.
- Raising somebody can have pretty dangerous side-effects on top of it, because a soul coming back from the afterlife into a body that has been dead for a while isn't going smoothly a lot of times.

I can only recommend it to those who dislike the standard Raise Dead system. I actually believe it also is a lot more of a bone for a "simulationist" (whatever that is) than the idea they are kicking around for 4E.


----------



## jdrakeh (Mar 20, 2008)

Stalker0 said:
			
		

> Raise Dead: Its one of those things that is always an issue for world builders. How does a society deal with a world in raising the dead is so easy? Kings that can just come back, high priests that cannot really be killed.




Honestly, why not juyst take issue with magic altogether? Nohting like D&D magic has ever or will ever exist on Earth. This is just another one of those areas that highlights the total non-simulationist nature of D&D with regard to emulating real world physics. D&D simply isn't a simulation of reality. It never has been. People who continue to expect this thing from D&D will continue to be disappointed.


----------



## Derren (Mar 20, 2008)

Celebrim said:
			
		

> One thing many of the critics of societies in which the rich live for ever and can be raised from the dead are forgetting, is that we are also dealing with a society where everyone can get tangible evidence of an afterlife.  Everyone is going to live forever in some form.  It's just a question of where.
> 
> A very serious question in such a universe is, "Why would anyone want to live (here) forever?"




Raise Dead does not allow you to live forever, it just makes it very unlikely that you die because of unnatural means. After 70-90 years most human nobles will die, Raise Dead or not unless advanced transformation magic is applied.


----------



## VannATLC (Mar 20, 2008)

While a valid point for 3e worldisms, its not longer true of 4e.

*some* people get an afterlife with their god. Most disappear.


----------



## lukelightning (Mar 20, 2008)

I've never seen what the big deal about raise dead, et. al., was. Maybe it's because I see D&D as a game and not a novel.

I just want to play the game and keep playing the game. If a beloved PC dies, I want to get that PC back in a reasonably timely manner so we can keep on playing.  I don't want to have to stop the game in order to go on an epic side trek to get the PC's soul back... that basically entails saying to Bob "don't bother coming to the game for next couple of weeks while the rest of us get your character's soul back."

If you make it that difficult, what's to keep Bob from pulling a "Brewfest" and go "here's my new character. He's an elf ranger just like Skipper, my previous character, and in fact is my previous character's twin brother... and out of respect for his deceased twin he wants you to call him Skipper."

Of course, I'm also used to my gaming group in which we all have a gazillion character ideas floating around in our heads, so we kind of get excited when a character dies... that means we can finally use that other character idea we had.


----------



## Celebrim (Mar 20, 2008)

Derren said:
			
		

> Raise Dead does not allow you to live forever, it just makes it very unlikely that you die because of unnatural means. After 70-90 years most human nobles will die, Raise Dead or not unless advanced transformation magic is applied.




Pardon me for being unclear.  My reply was made in the context of my earlier mention of 'Potions of Longevity' and similar life extenders.  My point being that 'Raise Dead' is of a class of 'medical technologies' that extend life, not that any particular one of these technologies is in and of itself sufficient for immortality (or even long life).


----------



## Filcher (Mar 20, 2008)

Love it. Why leave the afterlife unless you have a job to do?


----------



## Amphimir Míriel (Mar 20, 2008)

robertliguori said:
			
		

> I am familiar with OoTS, and the event you mention.  I think it shows perfectly why the old rule  works fine. _[discussion about the differences between Lord Shojo and Roy Greenhilt...] _




As a matter of fact, I wasn't talking about Lord Shojo as an example of a dramatic failure of a Raise Dead spell.
---Spoiler below---


Spoiler



I was talking about Roy´s little brother.


---Spoiler above---​


----------



## Steely Dan (Mar 20, 2008)

I and most of the people I have role-played with detest all forms of raise dead etc, it almost feels like cheating to us.


----------



## DM_Blake (Mar 20, 2008)

Stogoe said:
			
		

> Welcome to the other side of the fence; the side where the game doesn't cater to your every whim and you might have to houserule something, or several somethings.  We've lived with the Immortal Oligarchy rez-rule for multiple editions, and we've had to tweak it/throw it out wholesale to make the game work for us.
> 
> You'll get used to it; we did.




That's not the same thing at all.

Adding Raise Dead (et. al.) is like putting extra saws and hammers in a toolbox. It is then up to the carpenter which tools he will use, and how he will use them. Don't want that particular hammer, then don't use it.

Creating an arbitrary "Coming back to life requires a "destiny" that you need to fulfill" rule is like telling that carpenter he can build the house, but he is not allowed to use any nails.

Put another way, one approach adds options for us to use or not use as we see fit. The other approach restricts our ability to use the options that we have.

My take on gaming, and on life, is that more options is preferable to more restrictions.


----------



## Derren (Mar 20, 2008)

Filcher said:
			
		

> Love it. Why leave the afterlife unless you have a job to do?




Have you seen how the 4E afterlife looks?


----------



## Steely Dan (Mar 20, 2008)

Derren said:
			
		

> Have you seen how the 4E afterlife looks?




Yeah, I suggest bringing a magazine.


----------



## MichaelK (Mar 20, 2008)

I agree that this is a "bone to simulationism". Not necessarily a great one, but it's a valiant try and at least they made the effort. Still it's not to my liking. 

Anyway I've never had a problem with raise dead and I'm more simulationist than anything else.


----------



## Clawhound (Mar 20, 2008)

DM_Blake said:
			
		

> That's not the same thing at all.
> 
> Adding Raise Dead (et. al.) is like putting extra saws and hammers in a toolbox. It is then up to the carpenter which tools he will use, and how he will use them. Don't want that particular hammer, then don't use it.
> 
> ...




The game restricts nothing. What the game has done is expand your toolchest by placing the tools where you need them: in the negative hit point rules. Now you have a much better toolchest for having characters be down and unable to fight without them idly dying by mischance. 

I threw out the negative hit point rules last year. I went with a system that encourage my character to act like heroes and rewarded them for extreme bravery in helping a downed comrad. I found that this worked far better in the game than killing the character. A dead character left the table in a black haze, while a good rescue left the rescuer feeling like his character just did something cool.


----------



## Ruin Explorer (Mar 20, 2008)

This is cute, and it's "simulationist" in the sense that it vaguely resembles something from a Sword & Sorcery fantasy tale or the like (as opposed to High Fantasy, wierdly enough, where Fate is rarely in play in this sense), but I think it's little "over-specific" in the way a lot of the 4E stuff is, in that it specifically suggests that there are such things as Fates and Destinies (which is new to D&D as a solid background element, I'd suggest, and doesn't fit into some campaign settings at all) and that they're "real" and "actual", and that "the peasants" don't have them.

I mean, it adds a whole other twist, really, in the if raise dead only works on people with "unfulfilled destinies", then every peasant ever is going to want raise dead to be TRIED on their dead husband who has left them with three children (let alone the dead kids who "obviously" had unfulfilled destines, I mean, didn't they?). When it doesn't work, then they're forced to see that they're apparently unimportant. Indeed this "little change" dictates the entire structure of the cosmos and religion, into a rather "Ancient Greek" mode, where Heroes are big, important people (not necessarily "heroic" in any modern sense) who have destinies, and every else? Well they're just guys. 

Do I hate that? No, I kind of like it. But I think Mr WotC in the interview is really understating or underestimating how much this matters. It's a huge deal, and dictates a very specific kind of world/cosmos (unless people are just dumb and "don't get it", attributing "failure to res" to random whims of the gods/useless clerics, which seems unlikely).


----------



## Hellcow (Mar 20, 2008)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> That's the simulationists' problem with this new Raise Dead rule. It basically says that "Raise Dead works for world-people relevant to the current story arc, but not for anyone else."  That "doesn't work" because to a simulationist _everyone_ has their own story arc.  From within the game there shouldn't be any way to tell the difference between an NPC and a PC. Now there is.




First, I would like to point out (again) that far too much is being made of my comment. What I said *was not a direct quote of the rules*. The word "destiny" is not, in fact, used in the description of raise dead - and it's not my place to give the actual description. Raise dead was used as an example of a greater point as to why I think 4E works well for Eberron. 

And part of that reason is because, quite simply, in Eberron there IS a difference between an NPC and a PC. There always has been, and one clearly enshrined by the rules: Action points. One of the basic principles of Eberron is that there is something remarkable about the PCs - something that DOES set them apart from the common masses. To me, I compare the Fellowship of the Ring to the Rohirrim. In the Rohirrim, you have soldiers who have spent their entire lives hunting orcs every day. And yet, somehow, they aren't as tough or amazing as Legolas, Gimli, or Aragorn. They're good at what they do - but they aren't the heroes. Eberron has always been based on the assumption that if the story was a novel or a movie, you'd be the main character. As some others have said, in a way it's more mythological than anything else; you're Hercules or Perseus, someone who will do remarkable things... whether you're changing the fate of the world, or simply solving crimes in the depths of Sharn. You may decide to be Sam Spade instead of Batman, but in time, you'll still end up being one of the best inquisitives of the age. 

So in THAT way, Eberron is entirely and intentionally unrealistic. It's right there in "Ten Things You Should Know About Eberron" - the PCs are heroes, and action points are one clear, mechanical sign of this. If you want a setting where Uncle Owen could have been just as cool as Luke Skywalker if HE'D gone with Ben instead of staying on the farm, Eberron isn't really the place for you - and hey, I respect that. 

Beyond this, however, Eberron is a setting in which I want the impact of magic to be taken to its logical conclusion. So once you set the heroic PCs aside, we have tried to bring realism to the world. Which is why magical healing is an industry. And that comes to the problem. Early in this thread, someone said "As far as I'm concerned, resurrection is so rare that it's not a problem." But in Eberron, in theory, it's not - because of House Jorasco's altars of resurrection. It's a service, just like _cure disease_. However, in my opinion, the history and culture of the world does not accurately take the impact of such a service into account. It's there because PCs need it to be there, because they die alot - but we don't see its impact in the death of Aeren, of Jarot, even Erandis d'Vol. And in a world where the afterlife is bleak, the keys to immortality should make House Jorasco one of the most influential forces on the planet - far more so than we've shown so far. What king would dare challenge the keepers of life? 

So: first and foremost, to those saying "Well, what's 'destiny' mean, anyway?" - 4E doesn't use that term. *I* used that term in saying that I like what 4E has done because it fits the fact that heroes in Eberron ARE supposed to be touched by destiny... however you want to read that. So that already is going to be something you'll hate if you want Uncle Owen and Luke, Aragorn and the random Rohirrim to all have the same potential; but it's part of Eberron, and if you hate it, I doubt you're playing Eberron. My point in that original post is that Eberron is a world in which heroes ARE special, and in which magic has a logical and institutionalized place in society - and the current version of _raise dead_ does a better job of bridging the gap between those two things.


----------



## Ilium (Mar 20, 2008)

I was about to reply in detail, but Hellcow beat me to it and (naturally) did a better job.  I will mention one thing, though.  

My take on this change is not that random peasants will be mad/depressed/outraged that they have no "special destiny."  It's that most people would never even consider the possibility that their loved ones could come back from the dead.  This is exactly how I've run things in my campaign already, where Raise Dead is available only to those who have been killed through the use of "blasphemous death magic."  This is sufficiently nebulous to let me use it when I want, but not have anyone _expect_ to come back from the dead.


----------



## Hellcow (Mar 20, 2008)

Ruin Explorer said:
			
		

> But I think Mr WotC in the interview is really understating or underestimating how much this matters. It's a huge deal, *and dictates a very specific kind of world/cosmos...*



First, I'm not "Mr. WotC" - I'm a freelancer. Second, did you actually read the entire post, or simply the isolated and out of context quote posted on ENWorld? Because my post was actually about how this was good for _a very specific type of world/cosmos_... namely, Eberron.

In terms of "Would people try it, just to see if it worked"? Sure, they very well might. They'd know just how unlikely it was, that people successfully returning from the dead is a thing of near-legend, but I'm sure Jorasco would be happy to take their gold and give the wheel a spin. That doesn't bother me at all. My point is that I don't feel that Eberron as it stands is an accurate reflection of a society in which _resurrection_ is a reliable service provided at the equivalent of any major hospital. Again, such a tool should give House Jorasco incredible political power, and furthermore have lessened the impact of the Last War, since many of the heroes that fell in battle would have been raised by their nations. I WANT a world in which there are fallen legends who can't be brought back, in which the PC cleric can't choose to raise the murder victim even if he's willing to spend the gold. I've got no problem with him trying, desperately hoping that this one might return - but I'm just as happy that if I say "He doesn't," I don't have to explain why not (yes, I can say "He's choosing not to come back", but that's not always going to make much sense - especially when you're choosing between life and Dolurrh, not life and Heaven). The PC knew the odds when he tried, and if he wants to get the ally back, he can always try to go to Dolurrh and pull him back - but at least now it's an adventure. 

So I certainly understand that it's a huge deal, and one that favors a very specific sort of world... which is exactly what I was saying in that original post, in which raise dead was in fact a fairly trivial point.


----------



## wgreen (Mar 20, 2008)

At the same time, I don't understand why this would have such dire consequences for so many people, if 4e _did_ use a phrasing like Mr. Baker did.  Probably has something to do with why everyone's inappropriately capitalizing words like "destiny," which, from what we've heard, affords the word much more importance than either the 4e rules or Mr. Baker would.

-Will!


----------



## MichaelK (Mar 20, 2008)

I hope I'm not the only one with a vision of Miracle Max over a dead body going,

"Hello in there, what's so important here, what have you got that's worth living for?"

(The resurrection scene from the Princess Bride)


----------



## Ruin Explorer (Mar 20, 2008)

Hellcow said:
			
		

> First, I'm not "Mr. WotC" - I'm a freelancer. Second, did you actually read the entire post, or simply the isolated and out of context quote posted on ENWorld? Because my post was actually about how this was good for _a very specific type of world/cosmos_... namely, Eberron.
> 
> In terms of "Would people try it, just to see if it worked"? Sure, they very well might. They'd know just how unlikely it was, that people successfully returning from the dead is a thing of near-legend, but I'm sure Jorasco would be happy to take their gold and give the wheel a spin. That doesn't bother me at all. My point is that I don't feel that Eberron as it stands is an accurate reflection of a society in which _resurrection_ is a reliable service provided at the equivalent of any major hospital. Again, such a tool should give House Jorasco incredible political power, and furthermore have lessened the impact of the Last War, since many of the heroes that fell in battle would have been raised by their nations. I WANT a world in which there are fallen legends who can't be brought back, in which the PC cleric can't choose to raise the murder victim even if he's willing to spend the gold. I've got no problem with him trying, desperately hoping that this one might return - but I'm just as happy that if I say "He doesn't," I don't have to explain why not (yes, I can say "He's choosing not to come back", but that's not always going to make much sense - especially when you're choosing between life and Dolurrh, not life and Heaven). The PC knew the odds when he tried, and if he wants to get the ally back, he can always try to go to Dolurrh and pull him back - but at least now it's an adventure.
> 
> So I certainly understand that it's a huge deal, and one that favors a very specific sort of world... which is exactly what I was saying in that original post, in which raise dead was in fact a fairly trivial point.




Apologies, Keith, for calling you Mr WotC, that was uncalled for! I agree with what you're saying, though, apparently I was just explicitly stating some of this for my own benefit. I wasn't really trying to criticise, as much as understand what this meant. For Eberron, yeah, this is a very good fit. For other settings, well, I guess that'll depend on the exact wording and functionality.


----------



## Steely Dan (Mar 20, 2008)

MichaelK said:
			
		

> "Hello in there, what's so important here, what have you got that's worth living for?"




"...To blaive…"


----------



## Ruin Explorer (Mar 20, 2008)

Ilium said:
			
		

> My take on this change is not that random peasants will be mad/depressed/outraged that they have no "special destiny."  It's that most people would never even consider the possibility that their loved ones could come back from the dead.  This is exactly how I've run things in my campaign already, where Raise Dead is available only to those who have been killed through the use of "blasphemous death magic."  This is sufficiently nebulous to let me use it when I want, but not have anyone _expect_ to come back from the dead.




This seems to be a complete defiance of human nature. If there's any possibility, no matter how vague, that you can bring people back to life, it will be significant to those who really care. The reasons your peasants don't consider it is entirely different - yours is specific to being killed by magic (presumably including undead, aberrations, etc.), but with this, anyone killed before "fulfilling their destiny" (or however WotC has worded it, which may be everything, in the end) could be raised. That's dramatically different. Few are going to believe their husband's "destiny" was to crushed by a hay bale, and even if people do, they're going to feel funny about it. A typical "medieval faux-Christian society" which is present in most D&D settings just doesn't fit with this sort of thing at all.


----------



## Hellcow (Mar 20, 2008)

Ruin Explorer said:
			
		

> Apologies, Keith, for calling you Mr WotC, that was uncalled for!



Now, "Uncle Eberron" I'll accept. 



			
				Ruin Explorer said:
			
		

> For other settings, well, I guess that'll depend on the exact wording and functionality.



That's really all I'm saying. I wasn't intending my post to be a big revelation about raise dead in 4E, and wasn't precisely quoting the rules (nor can I by NDA). The way it's set up is something I think works well in Eberron; it may or may not work as well in other settings, and you'll be able to decide for yourself soon enough. 

In any case, it certainly is something that can be house-ruled any number of ways, and I've seen some great suggestions out of some of these threads as to how other people have handled it. I myself always have restricted it. I simply feel that the current official version addresses its role in Eberron well - while in the past I felt it was something that really required a house ruling for the world to make sense.


----------



## Clawhound (Mar 20, 2008)

There's a big difference what happens to a peasant and what happens to a PC.

A peasant, a merchant, a king: these are all NPCs that act exactly as I, the DM, dictate. They can work by any rules that I see fit. These characters do not have Player's handbooks. They are not central to the story. Once they walk off the panel, they cease to exist. They are like the painted backdrop to a set: they exist only to give your world false depth. They are the illusion of a living, breathing world.

Let's use a different piece of logic: if all you needed was a sword and armor, and you could go out and make fantastic amounts of money, why isn't everyone doing that? Why doesn't the entire population just get up and go treasure hunting? Why don't governments tax or seize discovered caches of treasure? Why don't dragons establish multinational corporations to multiply their assets?

Answer: That's not a fun game.

You can take simulation too far. In the game, we have many conceits that make no sense. They are there because we need them to make the genre work. That's it. That's as far as it goes. If you mistake the genre rules for the world rules, you quickly wind up with a pile of steaming nonsense.

The term for this is "suspension of disbelief." No, none of this stuff is real. We pretend. We even pretend that the world makes sense, even if the logical underpinnings of it are no deeper than panted canvas. We do this so that we can run around, kill monsters, take their stuff, and be hailed as heroes.


----------



## Will (Mar 20, 2008)

That is a cheap argument. Ultimately, suspension of disbelief is a personal thing.

I mean, if I wrote that if you fumble with a sword you heal your opponent rather than hurt them, you don't think people would be annoyed?

Some people enjoy a game more when they feel it 'makes sense' in various ways.

If a game doesn't have to make sense for you? Great. Let us try to have our own fun?


----------



## JohnSnow (Mar 20, 2008)

Clawhound said:
			
		

> You can take simulation too far. In the game, we have many conceits that make no sense. They are there because we need them to make the genre work. That's it. That's as far as it goes. If you mistake the genre rules for the world rules, you quickly wind up with a pile of steaming nonsense.
> 
> The term for this is "suspension of disbelief." No, none of this stuff is real. We pretend. We even pretend that the world makes sense, even if the logical underpinnings of it are no deeper than panted canvas. We do this so that we can run around, kill monsters, take their stuff, and be hailed as heroes.




I never do this, but...QFT.

However, I'll caveat that by geeking out: "Many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view." 

And on that I can honestly say truer words were never spoken. So if you disagree, it's because you have a different point of view.


----------



## abeattie (Mar 20, 2008)

robertliguori said:
			
		

> Rules should be written with the assumption that people will try to break them.  If you trust people not to break the rules, then keep them vague and simply describe outcomes.  If you don't trust people, then the rules should either resist breakage, or break into awesome non-game-destroying pieces (like characters giving middle fingers to fate).




Er... you have a destiny if the game isn't over -- you don't if this is the last session?

Sure -- kings and such could have "grand destinies" that you actually watch -- it's just sort of assumed with PCs that they will go on to do Greater Deeds -- it's the job description.

They seem to have done alot in this version to shape the rules to support "story appropriate effect" I think this is just another example. 

-Adam


----------



## Wulfram (Mar 20, 2008)

Unless Mr Baker is grievously misrepresenting the position, I don't like 4E's handling of Raise Dead.  Of course, I didn't like 3.5e's handling much either.



			
				Hellcow said:
			
		

> To me, I compare the Fellowship of the Ring to the Rohirrim. In the Rohirrim, you have soldiers who have spent their entire lives hunting orcs every day. And yet, somehow, they aren't as tough or amazing as Legolas, Gimli, or Aragorn. They're good at what they do - but they aren't the heroes.




[tolkien pedant]If they've been fighting as long as the 87 year old Aragorn, or half as long as 139 year old Gimli. or a 10th as long as Legolas, who refers to the other two as children and considers 500 years as but a little while, then, as mere ordinary Men with sensible lifespans, they're likely in pretty poor shape to be fighting Orcs.[/tolkien pedant]


----------



## DM_Blake (Mar 20, 2008)

Clawhound said:
			
		

> Let's use a different piece of logic: if all you needed was a sword and armor, and you could go out and make fantastic amounts of money, why isn't everyone doing that? Why doesn't the entire population just get up and go treasure hunting?




Oh, now you've opened a can of bees...

Why isn't everyone taking a sword and armor and going out to make fantastic amounts of money?

1. It's very dangerous. Most such people are never seen or heard from again. Monster treasure hoards are full of loot from dead adventurers. Ergo, many people choose to be merchants, farmers, inn keepers, etc. They make less money, but probably live long and die of old age.
2. The best adventurers are not special because they have a mystical destiny. They're unusually strong, or brilliant, or dextrous. They have unusual physical and mental aptitudes that make them elite compared to John Q. Average. Sure, Fred the Farmer might sire a child who grows up to have an 18 STR, 16 CON, 16 DEX, and this child might be cut out to be an adventurer. But this is rare. Much more common is the farmer's son with ability scores of all 10, or close to it - not adventurer material.
3. It takes training. Just grabbing a sword and some armor doesn't make you a fighter. Grabbing a staff and pointy hat won't make you a wizard. Most adventurers come from somoene who was connected, or just lucky enough, so that they were able to receive the necessary training early in life to become an adventuring class.
4. It takes a certain mindset to trapse off into uncharted wilderness, suffering hardships and danger at every turn, facing the unknown, risking your life daily, for the hope of wealth and glory. Not everyone values wealth and glory enough to choose that way of life. Some will place family values over weath and glory. Others will become militia or watch commanders, finding a decent paycheck and occasional chances to prove themselves to be adequate adventure. Still others find loyalty to their king, country, city, religion, etc., to be sufficient reason to stay home and apply themselves locally.

Put that all together, and rephrase your question:
If all you needed was a sword and armor, elite physical and mental abilities, the right circumstance and training, and the kind of mindset to risk it all for weath and glory, and you could go out and make fantastic amounts of money, why isn't everyone doing that?

Answer: Most people who fit that bill are doing exactly that.




			
				Clawhound said:
			
		

> Why don't governments tax or seize discovered caches of treasure?




Good question.

My governments do.

You head out of your city, slay a dragon, come back and start flashing your wealth, you will get a visit from the tax collectors. And you'll get a visit from the ruling class who have assignments for you. Assignments that come with titles (sir, lord, maybe even baron) - these titles don't do much for you but pile on obligations to king and country (at least at first).



			
				Clawhound said:
			
		

> Why don't dragons establish multinational corporations to multiply their assets?




Another good question.

My dragons, and other monsters and bad guys, do.

Many good guys do this, and neutral guys, so why not evil guys or monstrous guys?

Dragons are fond of polymorphing and visiting society. And smart enough to know the value of concepts like diversification and compound interest. 

Many of my wealthy monsters become "power behind the throne" kind of manipulators - not always literally behind the king's throne, but sometimes referring to "silent partnerships" or "anonymous investors" for merchants, guilds, other powerful organizations, some of which are secretly financed and operated, or manipulated, by the kinds of monsters who get into this sort of thing. Fiends, illithids, dragons, beholders, vampires, liches, etc.

These kinds of monsters are more than willing to invest the coin in their lair to build an organization of business and other enterprises that accrue more wealth for the monster's coffers.

And some businessmen and organization leaders are corrupt and wicked enough to join forces with the vilest and most despicable monsters, as long as it benefits their organzation.



			
				Clawhound said:
			
		

> Answer: That's not a fun game.




I think it is.

I don't see why monsters have to be hidden in their lairs out in the trackless wastes. Well, not all monsters, anyway.

This kind of stuff lets the PCs use some of their skills in city environments from time to time, without having to make it about another romp to find the thieves in the sewers.


----------



## Clawhound (Mar 20, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> I never do this, but...QFT.
> 
> However, I'll caveat that by geeking out: "Many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view."
> 
> And on that I can honestly say truer words were never spoken. So if you disagree, it's because you have a different point of view.




This really gets to the question, "What is D&D?" Aye, that's a hard question. It's a VERY hard question.

Should characters be ordinary or extraordinary? Should they have open futures or fates? Should death be temporary or eternal? Should a fantasy reality be something that we recognize or be very different because magic changes so many baseline assumptions? Should it be high or low fantasy? Do the rules simulate reality or provide a special mechanism for the special? At what point do we write rules and at what point do we toss fluff?

I can't answer that question. The trick here is that a writer and a publisher MUST answer these questions. They can not keep the system entirely open-ended. Any system, and certainly any setting, must choose an answer to these questions.

Keith chose for Eberron because that choice reflects all the other choices that were made to produce Eberron. He really could not have chosen different. 

In order for a setting to work, your social logic must work, but your genre logic must also work. If your social logic contradicts your genre logic, then you need to go back and reexamine the logic for each until they match. In the end, that usually means choosing which is more important to you.


----------



## JohnSnow (Mar 20, 2008)

Wulfram said:
			
		

> [tolkien pedant]If they've been fighting as long as the 87 year old Aragorn, or half as long as 139 year old Gimli. or a 10th as long as Legolas, who refers to the other two as children and considers 500 years as but a little while, then, as mere ordinary Men with sensible lifespans, they're likely in pretty poor shape to be fighting Orcs.[/tolkien pedant]




[even-more tolkien pedant]One could just as easily make the same argument by comparing the exploits of Éomer, Éowyn, Boromir, or Faramir with those of the Rohirrim and the men of Gondor. Or by comparing Aragorn to the other members of the Grey Company (who are all Dúnedain - his kinsmen). Faramir's men are valiant enough, but Faramir is Faramir. Likewise, Éomer's men are valiant enough, but Éomer is different. And so on.

Even if you compare people of similar lifespans, there's definitely an important distinction to be made between the "heroes" (i.e. central figures) of the story and their supporting cast, which I believe was Keith's point.[/even-more tolkien pedant]


----------



## Hamburger Mary (Mar 20, 2008)

Wulfram said:
			
		

> [tolkien pedant]If they've been fighting as long as the 87 year old Aragorn, or half as long as 139 year old Gimli. or a 10th as long as Legolas, who refers to the other two as children and considers 500 years as but a little while, then, as mere ordinary Men with sensible lifespans, they're likely in pretty poor shape to be fighting Orcs.[/tolkien pedant]



But this argument is completely ludicrous when translated into D&D. 

On the subject of age, a 1st level elf fighter is at least 116 years old. A first level human fighter is at least 16 years old. And yet, they begin the game with the exact same level of skill.

Beyond starting age, both of these fighters won't go up in level when they live for a decade; they will go up in level when they gain 1,000 experience points, which they could easily do in the course of two days of adventuring. 

If time is the key, why is it that the elf - who's presumably been training in martial arts since before the human was even born - isn't already tougher? How can _two days_ suddently make him significantly better than those decades of early training? And are you suggesting that it would be impossible for any human to reach the same level of skill as Legolas in D&D terms? Because in all the games I've been in, it's never taken the PCs a century to reach epic level. 

The experience system of D&D simply doesn't make any realistic sense. Eberron just runs with this. The PC can in a week become a tougher fighter than the grizzled NPC war veteran because the PC is a hero. He's a Mozart or an Einstein - someone with gifts others don't have. The Force is strong in Luke; it's just plain not so strong in Uncle Owen, and if Ben had sent him to blow up the Death Star, things wouldn't have gone so well for the Rebellion. 

It's not realistic, because D&D isn't realistic. The idea of the blacksmith's best path to becoming a better blacksmith being combat is silly. You CAN play it that way, if that's how you want to play it - JohnSnow's comment is dead on here - but from my perspective, 3E is not a realistic simulation to begin with. Eberron just takes that ball and runs a little farther with it.


----------



## Hamburger Mary (Mar 20, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> [even-more tolkien pedant]One could just as easily make the same argument by comparing the exploits of Éomer, Éowyn, Boromir, or Faramir with those of the Rohirrim and the men of Gondor. Or by comparing Aragorn to the other members of the Grey Company (who are all Dúnedain - his kinsmen). Faramir's men are valiant enough, but Faramir is Faramir... Even if you compare people of similar lifespans, there's definitely an important distinction to be made between the "heroes" (i.e. central figures) of the story and their supporting cast, which I believe was Keith's point.[/even-more tolkien pedant]



Um... what he said. Except for the part where he said it better.


----------



## Wulfram (Mar 20, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> [even-more tolkien pedant]One could just as easily make the same argument by comparing the exploits of Éomer, Éowyn, Boromir, or Faramir with those of the Rohirrim and the men of Gondor. Or by comparing Aragorn to the other members of the Grey Company (who are all Dúnedain - his kinsmen). Faramir's men are valiant enough, but Faramir is Faramir. Likewise, Éomer's men are valiant enough, but Éomer is different. And so on.
> 
> Even if you compare people of similar lifespans, there's definitely an important distinction to be made between the "heroes" (i.e. central figures) of the story and their supporting cast, which I believe was Keith's point.[/even-more tolkien pedant]




Sure there's a difference.  They're stronger, wiser and/or braver, and they spend their time doing heroic things, which, if you don't end up dead, bring more XP than having a normal career - even a normal military career.  Just like in real life, some people are better at stuff than other people.

Doesn't mean they should cheat.  That just undermines their heroism.  Even I could be a hero if I got a special licence to be unkilled.


----------



## Dausuul (Mar 20, 2008)

DM_Blake said:
			
		

> That's not the same thing at all.
> 
> Adding Raise Dead (et. al.) is like putting extra saws and hammers in a toolbox. It is then up to the carpenter which tools he will use, and how he will use them. Don't want that particular hammer, then don't use it.




You ever try running a high-level (14+) game without resurrection magic?

In 3E, _raise dead_ was not optional unless you were prepared to either stick to low-level play, do some serious house-ruling, or tolerate one to two PC deaths per session.  Resurrection magic was very much hardwired into the game, and the game broke down without it.


----------



## JRRNeiklot (Mar 20, 2008)

Destiny?  Bah.  In my games, pcs and npcs alike have free will.  They make their own damn Destiny.  Either raise dead is available or it isn't.


----------



## JohnSnow (Mar 20, 2008)

Wulfram said:
			
		

> Sure there's a difference.  They're stronger, wiser and/or braver, and they spend their time doing heroic things, which, if you don't end up dead, bring more XP than having a normal career - even a normal military career.  Just like in real life, some people are better at stuff than other people.
> 
> Doesn't mean they should cheat.  That just undermines their heroism.  Even I could be a hero if I got a special licence to be unkilled.




See, I guess I just prefer the defaults as laid out in _Worlds and Monsters_. Even heroes can die, and only the mightiest of them (Paragon or Epic) ever "come back" from beyond.

An ordinary person can't be resurrected because the "cost" of coming back (not "financial cost," but "cost" in terms of heroic deeds) is just beyond them.

I like this set-up because I like death to be meaningful. "Woe is us, the king is dead!" should get more of a reaction from the PCs than "So? Just have someone cast _raise dead_."

Miraculous healing is fine. But coming back from the dead more often than a comic-book superhero bugs me.

Obviously, this is just my "genre preference."


----------



## Hellcow (Mar 20, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> I like this set-up because I like death to be meaningful. "Woe is us, the king is dead!" should get more of a reaction from the PCs than "So? Just have someone cast _raise dead_."



I feel the same way - and it's something made trickier in Eberron by the very fact that magic IS an industry. For me, the principle of Eberron has always been "wide magic" versus "high magic". Low level magic is common and seen all over the place, from the _continual flame_ used in street lamps to the _prestidigtation_ the innkeeper uses to chill the wine and clean the inn. House Jorasco can _cure disease_ for a fee, resulting in a world that has fewer poxes and plagues than you might otherwise expect. But high-level magic - teleportation, raise dead, and the like - is still supposed to impress people. Perhaps in a hundred years everyone will use _sending_ to communicate, but right now they're still using the _whispering wind_-based speaking stones. If you compare it to Stephen Brust's Dragaera books, it's closer to _The Phoenix Guards_ than to Vlad's era. 

And yet, as Dausuul points out, in D&D players generally need _raise dead_. It's a gamer's tool, a way to deal with a bad roll of the dice or a simply unavoidable sacrifice. My personal desire to make raising extremely rare because that's what fits the setting was at odds with the needs of PCs, who live ridiculously dangerous lives. 

All I'm saying is that the current interpretation (which again, does not actually use the word "destiny" anywhere) addresses these concerns, making it something that works for PCs while still having death be a weighty thing in the world - not "Damn, someone assassinated Joe again... drag him over to the Jorasco House on 30th. And don't forget to get your Frequent Die-er card punched!"

Both the problem and my satisfaction with the solution are specific to Eberron, and to my personal tastes. Outside of Eberron, your mileage will certainly vary.


----------



## JohnSnow (Mar 20, 2008)

Hellcow said:
			
		

> I feel the same way - and it's something made trickier in Eberron by the very fact that magic IS an industry. For me, the principle of Eberron has always been "wide magic" versus "high magic". Low level magic is common and seen all over the place, from the _continual flame_ used in street lamps to the _prestidigtation_ the innkeeper uses to chill the wine and clean the inn. House Jorasco can _cure disease_ for a fee, resulting in a world that has fewer poxes and plagues than you might otherwise expect. But high-level magic - teleportation, raise dead, and the like - is still supposed to impress people. Perhaps in a hundred years everyone will use _sending_ to communicate, but right now they're still using the _whispering wind_-based speaking stones. If you compare it to Stephen Brust's Dragaera books, it's closer to _The Phoenix Guards_ than to Vlad's era.




I actually am quite impressed with your take on magic in _Eberron_ Keith (I think I mentioned that over on the WotC boards back in the preview run-ups, along with making a few oddball _Micronauts_ jokes).

While I don't necessarily like *all* the things that have been done in _Eberron_, some of them I really love. And I realize that some of my likes and dislikes are a bit incongruous. For example, I love the bound-elemental airships, but bound-elemental coaches (there was one in one of the early adventures) are a little too "medieval automobile" for me. 

Does that make sense? No, not really. I guess I just prefer dialing back the "magical technology" so the setting feels more pre-1700 than post industrial revolution. On the other hand, I kinda like the "cyclical" nature of civilization hinted at in _Worlds and Monsters_. So there might be elemental galleons, but they're relics of a previous age, or a magical oddity, rather than something that people see every day.

But all this has nothing to do with _raise dead._

On topic, I have _The Phoenix Guards_. Sounds like I should pull it down and actually read it. 

EDIT: For the record: "Frequent die-er card" almost made me spew water out my nose...


----------



## Clawhound (Mar 20, 2008)

Dausuul said:
			
		

> You ever try running a high-level (14+) game without resurrection magic?
> 
> In 3E, _raise dead_ was not optional unless you were prepared to either stick to low-level play, do some serious house-ruling, or tolerate one to two PC deaths per session.  Resurrection magic was very much hardwired into the game, and the game broke down without it.




The hardwire is what I disliked about Raise Dead. You had to have it. For many of us, that broke genre. That turned death into a joke. You had to houserule Raise Dead out of the game, then you had to houserule new negative hitpoint rules.

I like the other way around better. You write good negative hitpoint rules to begin with. Downed characters should mean "now my own character does something heroic to save my friend." Death becomes rare because your characters act like heroes and have an in-genre means of explaining how a character got saved. 

Once you have that, then you can add in Raise Dead as you please, or not, depending on your final genre. That way, the DM can make the call about how he wants the game and you are not stuck with all societies having this weird get-out-of-death-free-card messing with the setting.


----------



## Hellcow (Mar 20, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> And I realize that some of my likes and dislikes are a bit incongruous. For example, I love the bound-elemental airships, but bound-elemental coaches (there was one in one of the early adventures) are a little too "medieval automobile" for me.  Does that make sense?



Sure. *I* don't like "land carts", for exactly the same reason. Originally, the vehicle in the adventure you're talking about wasn't a free-ranging elemental land cart; instead, it was a "Lightning Runner", a single-coach vehicle designed to run on lightning rails. Essentially, the equivalent of those old hand-carts - a limited passenger vehicle that still relied on the rail. This was also why you couldn't take it all the way into the Mournland; the rail is damaged at Rose Quarry. So it was supposed to just be a logical extension of the lightning rail - if I can run 10 linked coaches over the rail, can't I make just one? - as opposed to an entirely separate and arguably superior form of vehicle.


----------



## SmilingPiePlate (Mar 20, 2008)

Steely Dan said:
			
		

> "...To blaive…"




"He distinctly said 'to blaaaive', and we all know to blaive means to bluff. So someone was probably playing cards, and he cheated..."


----------



## Marmot (Mar 20, 2008)

*Don't forget the gods*

There's no need for a DM to ever directly make the decision about destiny outside the game.   

Gods exist in D&D, and the 4E clerics' spells that bring people back to life are "prayers" to those gods. 

The normal destiny for good people is to be rewarded by their good god with some sort of "heavenly" afterlife. This is reliable fact to people who live in D&D worlds--no less so than elves, magic or the existence of dragons.

Most good people would choose their god's heaven over going back to the material world.  While I know I am stepping outside D&D for the following analogy I think it's apt: Even Buffy, a true hero, had trouble dealing with returning to life after visiting her heaven...


> I was happy. Wherever I ... was ... I was happy. At peace. I knew that everyone I cared about was all right. I knew it. Time ... didn't mean anything ... nothing had form ... but I was still me, you know? And I was warm ... and I was loved ... and I was finished. Complete. I don't understand about theology or dimensions, or ... any of it, really ... but I think I was in heaven. And now I'm not. I was torn out of there. Pulled out ... by my friends. Everything here is ... hard, and bright, and violent. Everything I feel, everything I touch ... this is Hell. Just getting through the next moment, and the one after that ... (softly) knowing what I've lost... (gets up, walks towards the sunlight, pauses, not looking back) They can never know. Never. (continues into the sunlight)



Once in such a heavenly afterlife, even those who formerly feared death will no longer do so for the most part.  A good god would not see it as blessing to one of their followers  to send them back out of their heavenly realm back out into the material world.  

However, a good god will recognize that sometimes the necessity exists to grant such a prayer.  The god will of course use his knowledge of the person and the world/planes--including possible knowledge about the future--to decide whether to grant the prayer.  Some gods may even ask the dead person, "What have you got that's worth living for?"

In simulationst terms, it is up to the god being prayed to--acting according to their definition as an NPC--to decide whether any person's "destiny" is unfulfilled to such an extent that it is appropriate--again from the god's perspective, not the DM's meta-perspective--to answer the prayer to bring the person back to life.  The simulationist DM will treat the god as having no meta-knowledge about PC status.

Even more evil gods will engage in a similar assessment of whether they see the dead person's "destiny" as justifying the expenditure of power to bring them back to life.  Of course they will place weight on the factors that are most important to them--e.g. they probably won't care if the person is happy about being brought back to life but will care whether it furthers their godly interests.  Evil tends to see destiny from a more self-serving perspective.  (Evil gods also have other alternatives in the material world such as turning the dead into the undead to have them continue to serve their evilly divine purposes.)

Neutral gods might say "that's the way the cookie crumbles" or they may not even be bothered to take notice of prayers to revive the dead.

This approach allows for campaigns where death is permanent except for those rare cases where the gods themselves have identified someone as having an unfulfilled destiny that is so important--in the eyes of the god--that the god has decided they will use their divine power to restore them to life.


----------



## Wulfram (Mar 20, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> See, I guess I just prefer the defaults as laid out in _Worlds and Monsters_. Even heroes can die, and only the mightiest of them (Paragon or Epic) ever "come back" from beyond.
> 
> An ordinary person can't be resurrected because the "cost" of coming back (not "financial cost," but "cost" in terms of heroic deeds) is just beyond them.




I don't disagree with any of this necessarily.  Raise Dead only working on powerful people could work for me given the right fluff - for example, you could say that it simply gives you a thread to find your way back, but you've still got to fight your way out of the shadowfell, which wouldn't be a walk in park I'd guess.



> I like this set-up because I like death to be meaningful. "Woe is us, the king is dead!" should get more of a reaction from the PCs than "So? Just have someone cast _raise dead_."




I'm certainly not saying 3E's method of handling death was good.  I just don't think that changing to rely on fiat is a good way to go.  Better to find a real way of addressing it - for an off the top of my head example, prod Raise Dead up a level or two and scrap the Resurrection spells, though Miracle might be allowed to mimic their effect.  That way, the scenarios we get are

NPC: "Woe is us, the King is dead - and the assassin's taken his head
PCs: "We'll undertake the quest and fetch it back for you in time for him to be saved!"

or

NPC: "Woe is us the King is slain by foul necromantic magics.  Only the famed St Holyman can use the mighty magics necessary to revive him, and he lives in Remoteland, beyond the Desert of Death."
PCs: "We'll go fetch him!"



> Miraculous healing is fine. But coming back from the dead more often than a comic-book superhero bugs me.
> 
> Obviously, this is just my "genre preference."




I haven't read anything which suggests 4e will address this much, really.  PCs are the guys who are die all the time, and it seems they'll be left largely unrestricted.


----------



## JohnSnow (Mar 20, 2008)

Hellcow said:
			
		

> Sure. *I* don't like "land carts", for exactly the same reason. Originally, the vehicle in the adventure you're talking about wasn't a free-ranging elemental land cart; instead, it was a "Lightning Runner", a single-coach vehicle designed to run on lightning rails. Essentially, the equivalent of those old hand-carts - a limited passenger vehicle that still relied on the rail. This was also why you couldn't take it all the way into the Mournland; the rail is damaged at Rose Quarry. So it was supposed to just be a logical extension of the lightning rail - if I can run 10 linked coaches over the rail, can't I make just one? - as opposed to an entirely separate and arguably superior form of vehicle.




Okay, now *that* makes a whole lot more sense. Not that I'm entirely sold on the lightning rail, in the sense that it lends a bit of fantastical "cool" to almost any setting in the same way that (IMO) the bound-elemental airships do,* but in the context of _Eberron_, it works. And as a "lightning runner," I think that vehicle makes a whole lot more sense.

I guess it really comes down to the fact that everyone draws the line _somewhere_ on how fantastical they want their setting to be. And some things bother some people more than others. Bringing this back to raising the dead, I think it follows into a similar category. Some people like the implications of the rules as written in 3e, and find that those rules inspire them to be creative and make a setting that is _interesting_ to them.

Others (like myself) find those same implications either silly or disturbing, and would be happy if they no longer had to jump through hoops to make a different kind of setting work.

Different strokes I guess.


*One of my favorite bound-elemental airship moments came from a short story. Two deckhands on a bound-elemental galleon were talking and the younger, less-experienced one said something like: "Do you smell that? I think something's burning..." to which his older compatriot said "Kid, we're powered by a friggin' _fire elemental_! It _always_ smells like something's burning!" Priceless...


----------



## JohnSnow (Mar 20, 2008)

Wulfram said:
			
		

> I haven't read anything which suggests 4e will address this much, really.  PCs are the guys who are die all the time, and it seems they'll be left largely unrestricted.




Well, all I have to go on is this quote from _Worlds and Monsters_. Take it how you will...



> *Death Matters Differently:* It's generally harder to die than in previous editions, particularly at low level. When a heroic-tier player character dies, the player creates a new character. A paragon PC can come back from the dead at a significant cost. For epic-tier characters, death is a speed bump. Being raised from the dead is available only to heroes, and it's more than just a spell and a financial transaction. NPCs, both good and evil, don't normally come back to life unless the DM has a good reason.




For the record, I would like to point out that up until that last sentence, it's specifically talking about _player characters_, not NPCs.

Quite frankly, I prefer this. I'd rather it was harder for a PC to die than have him popping back from the dead all the time. By epic-tier, I can swallow that, but at the heroic-tier level? Sometimes even heroes die.


----------



## Mostlyjoe (Mar 21, 2008)

SmilingPiePlate said:
			
		

> "He distinctly said 'to blaaaive', and we all know to blaive means to bluff. So someone was probably playing cards, and he cheated..."




Ah....I was going to post something meaningful in this thread and then you just killed my mind there.


----------



## Ahglock (Mar 21, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> For the record, I would like to point out that up until that last sentence, it's specifically talking about _player characters_, not NPCs.
> 
> Quite frankly, I prefer this. I'd rather it was harder for a PC to die than have him popping back from the dead all the time. By epic-tier, I can swallow that, but at the heroic-tier level? Sometimes even heroes die.




I actually dig the idea that you can't be rezzed at heroic tier.  I'd be cool with hard set rules must be X level+ in order to be raised form the dead.  Or instead of a hard level limit make it a check that could only be possible by people of a certain level.  Just because I like earthdawn I'll make an earthdawn reference, something like need a thread weaving skill of 5 in order to be raised, while the ritual is happening you as a spirit must tie 5 threads(need that 5 ranks) to the ritual with a DC X check.  

 In D&d 4e terms since you get +.5 per level in every check it could be a inherent ability that requires at least 5 ranks, and a check DC 20 where all you get is your level bonus and maybe something from the power form the ritual.  

   This way it is not so DM fiatish, has some hard coded rules for how the world works and kings etc don't come back from the dead unless they were heroes in there own right,and you can still always say they did not want to come back they were happy in there gods embrace.


----------



## wgreen (Mar 21, 2008)

Ahglock said:
			
		

> This way it is not so DM fiatish, has some hard coded rules for how the world works and kings etc don't come back from the dead unless they were heroes in there own right,




Of course, we'll need campaign sourcebook writers to stop making every last one of their kings and such 17th-level fighters and paladins... 

-Will!


----------



## hong (Mar 21, 2008)

Ruin Explorer said:
			
		

> This is cute, and it's "simulationist" in the sense that it vaguely resembles something from a Sword & Sorcery fantasy tale or the like (as opposed to High Fantasy, wierdly enough, where Fate is rarely in play in this sense), but I think it's little "over-specific" in the way a lot of the 4E stuff is, in that it specifically suggests that there are such things as Fates and Destinies (which is new to D&D as a solid background element, I'd suggest, and doesn't fit into some campaign settings at all) and that they're "real" and "actual", and that "the peasants" don't have them.




Nonsense. It is UNDERspecific compared to other versions of D&D, which have always made resurrection something that depends only on how much money/time/resources you're willing to spend on it. That is what the s*mul*tionists are complaining about.



> Do I hate that? No, I kind of like it. But I think Mr WotC in the interview is really understating or underestimating how much this matters. It's a huge deal, and dictates a very specific kind of world/cosmos (unless people are just dumb and "don't get it", attributing "failure to res" to random whims of the gods/useless clerics, which seems unlikely).




"Random whims of the gods" seems very likely indeed, given that gods are pretty much uncontactable and inscrutable. That applies in particular to the Raven Queen, goddess of death.


----------



## Derren (Mar 21, 2008)

hong said:
			
		

> "Random whims of the gods" seems very likely indeed, given that gods are pretty much uncontactable and inscrutable. That applies in particular to the Raven Queen, goddess of death.




And appropriate encounters for 4E epic level parties.
When epic 4E parties are expected to fight gods as their final enemy, how can they be uncontactable and inscrutable? Not to forget that becoming a (demi)god seems to be a valid and reachable character goal.


----------



## hong (Mar 21, 2008)

Derren said:
			
		

> And appropriate encounters for 4E epic level parties.
> When epic 4E parties are expected to fight gods as their final enemy, how can they be uncontactable and inscrutable? Not to forget that becoming a (demi)god seems to be a valid and reachable character goal.




That's when you're good enough that you can pull gods out of their uncontactable and inscrutable bubbles.


----------



## BryonD (Mar 21, 2008)

hong said:
			
		

> Nonsense. It is UNDERspecific compared to other versions of D&D, which have always made resurrection something that depends only on how much money/time/resources you're willing to spend on it. That is what the s*mul*tionists are complaining about.



No that would be the straw man.


----------



## MichaelK (Mar 21, 2008)

WayneLigon said:
			
		

> The revolt stuff works all well and good when you're trying to capture a castle or grain silo or iron mine or whatever.. but what you want is a spellcaster. You can hold him hostage to do the spell and that'll probably work for a short time. You have to leave him hale and hearty, though, to be able to cast the spell which means he also has access to all the _other _ spells he could cast. Instead of Raise Dead, he prepares Lesser Planar Ally, summons a Janni and plane shifts out of prison.




And it gets worse. You're capturing a spellcaster who is granted their abilities at the whims of powerful extra-planar beings. Even if you convince the cleric to perform the spell, unless the deity is willing no magic will happen.


----------



## hong (Mar 21, 2008)

BryonD said:
			
		

> No that would be the straw man.



 Well, in that case, perhaps you're complaining about nothing.


----------



## Traycor (Mar 21, 2008)

Jayouzts said:
			
		

> While I agree with the sentiment, I am not sure what this changes.  If most PC's and major villians have unfinished destinies, how is that different from what we have now?



Well, in Forgotten Realms where there are lvl 10+ priests on every street corner in major cities, it means that every merchant can't just go get a rez if he falls off a cart and breaks his neck.

Under the old system, in a wealthy city like Waterdeep where clerics were overflowing, there was actually very little reason for ANYONE with a reasonable amount of wealth to ever die.

In fact... It would have been so easy for rich folk to get a rez, I could almost see family members being accused of murder if they _didn't_ get the person rezed. Coming back from the dead should never be "simple" and should never be a "given".


----------



## MichaelK (Mar 21, 2008)

Traycor said:
			
		

> Coming back from the dead should never be "simple" and should never be a "given".




This is why I used a modified version of the resurrection mishaps table from heroes of horror.


----------



## Clawhound (Mar 21, 2008)

In this case, what is good for the goose is not good for the gander. Coming back from the dead for PC's is a mechanic designed for the players, and in that context works tolerably. Coming back from the dead for the NPC's proves problematic because this creates societal conundrums that impact your entire setting. 

I can see why designers changed the ideal to, "Nobody gets brought back to life EXCEPT the exceptional." You've now reduced the complexity of your design problem while retaining the benefits of the rule.


----------



## DM_Blake (Mar 21, 2008)

Dausuul said:
			
		

> You ever try running a high-level (14+) game without resurrection magic?
> 
> In 3E, _raise dead_ was not optional unless you were prepared to either stick to low-level play, do some serious house-ruling, or tolerate one to two PC deaths per session.  Resurrection magic was very much hardwired into the game, and the game broke down without it.




Nope.

Characters of level 14+ have always had plenty of access to "back to life" spells. Save or Die, Save or Petrified (Stone to Flesh requires a Save or Die roll), and other similar effects are very common at these levels, and once in a while saves are failed. Especially since beholders are smart enough to use eye rays that require fort saves on the guy in the pointy hat and robe, and eye rays that require will saves on the guy charging into battle wielding big scary weapons (beholders really hate paladins).

I have no problem with high level PCs needing an occasional back-to-life spell. And neither does 3e or 4e D&D, apparently.

The difference between D&D editions is that in 3e, anyone who could afford the spell and could find someone to cast it could be brought back. Apparently in 4e that is no longer the case.

None of which affects the PCs, since we're assuming they always have the destiny to come back when the spell is cast.

I just don't like the heavy handed ruling that "Well, Fred lived a good and righteous life, but he can't come back even if his wife brings the material component to the arch-bishop of the Heironeus church, just because he doesn't have an unfulfilled dstiny."

There is no need for this kind of rule in a CORE rulebook.

Where this belongs, maybe, is in the DMG, in a chapter on world-building, maybe in a sidebar about considering the effects of back-to-life spells on the campaign setting. DMs should be advised about some possible ramifications of allowing free public access to the spells, and the ramifications of not allowing it, and then it should be left up to a DM to decide how it works in his campaign.

It should be a suggestion, not a core rule.

And that's if it is even mentioned in the core books at all.

The truly best place for a rule like this is in a specific campaign setting. When WotC (or anyone else) releases a campaign setting, let them put in rules governing this sort of thing so that the rule is specific to just that campaign setting. Grayhawk - maybe requires destiny. FR maybe doesn't. Ravenloft certainly limits these spells. Planescape certainly does not limit them. Etc.


----------



## hong (Mar 21, 2008)

DM_Blake said:
			
		

> The difference between D&D editions is that in 3e, anyone who could afford the spell and could find someone to cast it could be brought back. Apparently in 4e that is no longer the case.
> 
> None of which affects the PCs, since we're assuming they always have the destiny to come back when the spell is cast.
> 
> I just don't like the heavy handed ruling that "Well, Fred lived a good and righteous life, but he can't come back even if his wife brings the material component to the arch-bishop of the Heironeus church, just because he doesn't have an unfulfilled dstiny."




That's not heavy-handed at all. That's just, like, you know, real life. If you find yourself needing a rule to justify what happens in real life, that's a sign you're thinking too hard about fantasy.

Well, assuming that you would go to a real-life archbishop claiming to have the material component for resurrection, anyway.


----------



## DM_Blake (Mar 21, 2008)

Clawhound said:
			
		

> The hardwire is what I disliked about Raise Dead. You had to have it. For many of us, that broke genre. That turned death into a joke. You had to houserule Raise Dead out of the game, then you had to houserule new negative hitpoint rules.
> 
> I like the other way around better. You write good negative hitpoint rules to begin with. Downed characters should mean "now my own character does something heroic to save my friend." Death becomes rare because your characters act like heroes and have an in-genre means of explaining how a character got saved.




This is good, I agree with this - most of the time.

On the other hand, if PCs cannot die, they begin to act like the A-Team (remember that old show? I hear there's a movie coming out soon). Those guys could crash a helicopter at full speed into a cliff, fall hundreds of feet to the rocks below, and walk out of the wreckage).

I once had a DM that I knew never killed PCs. In fact, he saved them from death no matter what. In a new game he started, I had my little level 1 rogue sneak attack the heck out of a hill giant. He meant it to be a roleplaying encounter, but I turned it into a kill. Yes, I killed the giant. Solo. Because that giant miraculously missed me over and over, and I found ways to get away, then come back and sneak attack it, get away, repeat. I leveled up to level 4 off of that one kill.

Now that's a ridiculous example. No sane DM would allow that.

But PCs need to fear death. They need to know that if they make foolish plans, there will be consequences that cannot be hand-waived away by having their friend "heroically" save them.

Without fear of death, the PCs decision making goes from "OK, that looks like a tough fight. We need to carefully plan out a strategy to make sure we all live through it." to "OK, there's another walking pile of loot for us. Charge! The DM will make sure we don't die!"

OK, that's kind of drastic. It's not really quite that bad. But I hope it serves to illustrate the point of how players in many games really do view encounters as a source of XP and loot, rather than as a risky tactical or strategic challenge to be overcome.



			
				Clawhound said:
			
		

> Once you have that, then you can add in Raise Dead as you please, or not, depending on your final genre. That way, the DM can make the call about how he wants the game and you are not stuck with all societies having this weird get-out-of-death-free-card messing with the setting.




Now this I agree with. It should be up to the DM.

What I don't agree with is the Core rulebooks having a rule about this - it should be a footnote in the world-building section in the DMG to educate DMs about it and leave it up to them. 

It should be a rule in a campaign setting, not a core rulebook.


----------



## DandD (Mar 21, 2008)

Huh? Are you disagreeing with DM_Blake anywhere, hong? Seems that you two agree with each another...


----------



## DM_Blake (Mar 21, 2008)

Marmot said:
			
		

> There's no need for a DM to ever directly make the decision about destiny outside the game.
> 
> Gods exist in D&D, and the 4E clerics' spells that bring people back to life are "prayers" to those gods.
> 
> ...




Excellent point, Marmot. You've echoed and beautifully expanded on one of my earlier points about why everyone in 3e D&D isn't always brought back.

It's up to the individual. Even after the spell is cast, the individual might just say "Nope, I like it here and I won't go back". Spell succeeds, but results fail - the corpse is not raised from the dead.

This is one of the reasons why it is not necessary to lay down the law and rule that bringing back the dead only work on people with specific destiny.

Such a rule is really not needed at all.


----------



## hong (Mar 21, 2008)

DM_Blake said:
			
		

> This is one of the reasons why it is not necessary to lay down the law and rule that bringing back the dead only work on people with specific destiny.




Nobody said anything about "specific destinies".


----------



## DM_Blake (Mar 21, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> Well, all I have to go on is this quote from _Worlds and Monsters_. Take it how you will...
> 
> 
> 
> ...




Now here, You, I, and Worlds & Monsters are all in agreement, mostly. 

I'm willing to let heroic PCs find a way, a quest, a bargain, whatever, to raise someone. Could be a good adventure. Usually I let the raise happen first, so that PC doesn't have to sit out on several gaming sessions while this adventure is resolved.

And I surely don't mind expecting the DM to have a good reason for a NPC to come back to life. For me, a good reason is "he's the king - of course we'll try to raise him". For some people, that's not a good enough reason.

I am not even arguing to convince anyone that my reasons are better than theirs.

All I am saying is that it should be up to the DM to define what constitutes "a good reason" for NPC resurrection. It _should not _ be a core rule. It _should _ be a campaign setting rule.

That's all I am saying here.


----------



## DM_Blake (Mar 21, 2008)

wgreen said:
			
		

> Of course, we'll need campaign sourcebook writers to stop making every last one of their kings and such 17th-level fighters and paladins...
> 
> -Will!




Well said!

I hate that too...


----------



## Will (Mar 21, 2008)

In my games, I was considering a Fate mechanic that meant if it wasn't the right circumstances, you couldn't die!

Mind you, that mechanic doesn't save you from being horribly maimed...

I never implemented it, but if I did, I'd probably have permanent stat damage and injuries as a result of narrow escapes.

"You are destined not to die until the conjunction of Arithakin and Delb."
'What?'
"Astrological conjunction. Not due to happen for 60 years."
'Awesome!'
...
~Kinda sucks that Doug got sick from that mummy and has been in a coma these past 60 years.~
#Yeah. But he finally died in his sleep.#


----------



## DM_Blake (Mar 21, 2008)

Traycor said:
			
		

> Well, in Forgotten Realms where there are lvl 10+ priests on every street corner in major cities, it means that every merchant can't just go get a rez if he falls off a cart and breaks his neck.
> 
> Under the old system, in a wealthy city like Waterdeep where clerics were overflowing, there was actually very little reason for ANYONE with a reasonable amount of wealth to ever die.
> 
> In fact... It would have been so easy for rich folk to get a rez, I could almost see family members being accused of murder if they _didn't_ get the person rezed. Coming back from the dead should never be "simple" and should never be a "given".




Why not?

We accept fireballs as a "given". We accept flame strike spells as a "given" - and that requires the same kind of caster using the same level spell lost as Raise Dead.

In a world where all kinds of wonderful magic exists, unicorns, flaming swords, leprechauns, drgons, djinni, wish spells, teleporting, flying carpets, heck, there's millions of magical mystical things in D&D, why is raise dead so special that we need ruling to limit its use?

Again, I say this is a campaign setting decision.

The campaign writers of Forgotten Realms made Waterdeep, populated it with "lvl 10+ priests on every street corner", knowing full well that Raise Dead is on their spell lists. They could have added rules to the Forgotten Realms limiting raising the dead, but they didn't. Therefore, their decision was to allow "ANYONE with a reasonable amount of wealth to ever die". Apparently that's how it works in Forgotten Realms.

Other campaigns vary. And they _should _ vary.

But this variance should be up to the DM without having it explicitly ruled in the core rulebooks.


----------



## hong (Mar 21, 2008)

DM_Blake said:
			
		

> All I am saying is that it should be up to the DM to define what constitutes "a good reason" for NPC resurrection. It _should not _ be a core rule. It _should _ be a campaign setting rule.
> 
> That's all I am saying here.




I'm kinda baffled why you're even arguing then. Nobody has ever said that the rulebooks will contain specific reasons why some people are resurrectable and some aren't. Keith Baker said himself up above, that the "destiny" thing was just informal language on his part, not something in the rules themselves.


----------



## Clawhound (Mar 21, 2008)

DM_Blake said:
			
		

> Now this I agree with. It should be up to the DM.
> 
> What I don't agree with is the Core rulebooks having a rule about this - it should be a footnote in the world-building section in the DMG to educate DMs about it and leave it up to them.
> 
> It should be a rule in a campaign setting, not a core rulebook.




(IMHO, I WANT my players acting like the A-Team. They're frikin heroes already. Don't be weanies!!!)

Where I see including/not including some clause is that either the presence or absence of such a clause says something. If the clause is not in a spell or ritual, then the physics of the world does not include such a thing. The default view of the game is that such a thing is possible. Now every game has it, and removing it feels restricting to the players who expect it.

If it is included in a base rule, then others will feel restricted by this rule.

So either way, it has an impact.


----------



## Dausuul (Mar 21, 2008)

DM_Blake said:
			
		

> Why not?
> 
> We accept fireballs as a "given". We accept flame strike spells as a "given" - and that requires the same kind of caster using the same level spell lost as Raise Dead.
> 
> In a world where all kinds of wonderful magic exists, unicorns, flaming swords, leprechauns, drgons, djinni, wish spells, teleporting, flying carpets, heck, there's millions of magical mystical things in D&D, why is raise dead so special that we need ruling to limit its use?




Because _raise dead_ has tremendous impact on the fundamentals of society.  _Fireball_ doesn't imply a change in the very nature of the world; it's just another way to blow stuff up.  We can do that in reality, we just need a bit more gadgetry.  Dragons are more of a stretch, but still, a dragon is not so different from a fighter jet in terms of its capability to affect the world around it.

Offhand, the only spell I can think of that compares to _raise dead_ in its implications for the game world is _teleport_.  And that, too, looks like it's getting some hefty restrictions in 4E.

Now, can you construct an imaginary society that incorporates both of these things and is still internally consistent?  Sure.  But you have to build that society from the ground up.  The permanence of death is the foundation for all kinds of traditions, legends, laws, behavior patterns, social structures, and on and on and on.  (The necessity of passing through points in between when going from A to B has fewer social but almost as many geopolitical implications, and more strategic/military ones.)  You can't just slap 3E _raise dead_ onto a boilerplate medieval-fantasy world and have it make sense.

As Stogoe said, in previous editions the Immortal-Oligarchy rule was the default.  Apparently the 4E designers concluded that most people don't have much interest in building their game worlds around the ability to raise the dead.



			
				DM_Blake said:
			
		

> Again, I say this is a campaign setting decision. ... But this variance should be up to the DM without having it explicitly ruled in the core rulebooks.




There will be a default behavior for _raise dead_, no matter what, and that default is determined by whatever is or is not in the core books.  Leaving the restriction out carries just as much weight as putting it in.  The 4E designers have decided that the default should be "resurrection is flat-out impossible for 99% of people in 99% of circumstances," and I have to say I agree with them.

If you don't like the limitation, you will have to house-rule it out of your campaigns, true.  But that requires no more effort than for me to house-rule it _into_ mine.  In fact it requires less effort, because you only have to strike out an existing rule whereas I would have to make up a new one.  And since I very much doubt this particular rule has any game-balance implications (since it applies to NPCs only), striking it out should be as simple as saying "It doesn't work this way in my world."

One of us is going to have to house-rule.  There's no way around that.  4E's requirement that you house-rule is no more onerous than 3E's requirement that I do so.


----------



## wgreen (Mar 21, 2008)

Clawhound said:
			
		

> (IMHO, I WANT my players acting like the A-Team. They're frikin heroes already. Don't be weanies!!!)



SUBSCIRBE!!!!!!!1

-Will!


----------



## Immolate (Mar 21, 2008)

This rule change won't impact my game since we haven't allowed resurrection since first edition because (we believe) that it is the ultimate form of cheese. Of course there are ramifications to such a decision, such as having to deal with character replacement rules. Our concept has evolved to: either restart at first level or create a character with half the xp of the party average. Another issue was making characters more durable so that they didn't die quite so easily. We extended the unconscious range from -10 to -10+(constitution bonus). Add some Arms Law critical hits to that and you have characters dying several times in a year-long campaign, on average. Only once have we had a TPK, and that in the climactic battle. 

I like the changes in 4E, and I'm glad that they're moving to make death more meaningful within the rules, and I also appreciate the front-loading of hit points and big changes in death rules to make it less capricious, but we'll probably still houserule it away and houserule in the crits. The good news is that we shouldn't have to houserule out the 487 other instances of cheesey goodness that didn't make the trip from 3.5 to 4E.


----------



## KingCrab (Mar 21, 2008)

I can see destiny in two ways.

1. Everyone has a destiny ahead because whatever they end up choosing to do becomes their destiny (people shape their own destiny.)  Here everyone can be raised.

2. No one has a specific destiny as nothing is predetermined.  (Similar but a different way of looking at it.)  Here no one can be raised.

I'm a firm believer in choice, and people controlling their path.  Never is there something that someone absolutely has to do in the future because it is destined.  I think it makes the game exciting to know your path is not destined.


----------



## Dausuul (Mar 21, 2008)

KingCrab said:
			
		

> I can see destiny in two ways.
> 
> 1. Everyone has a destiny ahead because whatever they end up choosing to do becomes their destiny (people shape their own destiny.)  Here everyone can be raised.
> 
> ...




Third possibility: Some people have a destiny, but if you have one, it's what you were _meant_ to do.  You have the choice whether to actually do it or not--and you can be prevented from doing it.  (After all, if you die and nobody rezzes you, you can't very well fulfill your destiny even if you've got one.)

The powers of Fate push you toward your destiny, and will help guide you back to the path, even to the extent of letting you return from death; but the choice is always yours.


----------



## Just Another User (Mar 21, 2008)

JohnSnow said:
			
		

> See, the problem (such as it is) with this approach is that it just doesn't work for the kind of stories some of us want to tell or the kind of worlds we want to game in.
> 
> The notion that the rich can avoid death if they can pay the tab might be philosophically inconsistent with the kind of world we want. By insisting on an actual monetary "cost," you invalidate a number of sayings so essential to our conception of the world that the whole thing becomes irrelevant.
> 
> ...




FWIW, my simulationistic approach is this:

Cleric can raise people from dead, but most of the times they choose not too. Clericis have high wisdom after all, they can see all the problem you mentioned, and others more. so Raise Dead is not a "purchasable commodity" except in the sense that you must pay for the material components. if you want for a cleric to raise your friend you must give him a exceptionally good reason. Something like "it is the only one that have a hope to stop the demoinc invasion" could be a good one, for example.
Even being a king could not be enough, kings have heirs, one die, another one is made, but unless the king is needed alive right here, right now or something Really Bad(TM) happen the church would refuse to raise him.
PCs would have a little more leeway (call it my concession to gamism  ) but not even too much, a cleric that would go around casting  Raise dead too openly could put himself in some bad situations with his or someone else church. "abusing" god-given powers is a thing that religious people rarely see under a postivie light.

And the best part is, this is not even a house rule, it is just fluff, but it is good fluff, if I can say so myself.


----------



## Celebrim (Mar 22, 2008)

Dausuul said:
			
		

> Because _raise dead_ has tremendous impact on the fundamentals of society.  _Fireball_ doesn't imply a change in the very nature of the world; it's just another way to blow stuff up.




Well, sure, if you have alot of other ways to blow stuff up, fireball doesn't make a big impact.  But if you don't have alot of ways to blow stuff up, fireball has a huge impact on society.  

The existence of fireball makes tradional ancient warfare very difficult, because its based on undergoing alot of training in order to be able to perform efficiently in a very small dense formation so as to achieve a local concentration of force.  But fireball has the same sort of impact on tactics as rifled muskets and grapeshot.  Formation tactics are close to obselete, only commanders might not realize it yet.  If fireball is reasonably prevalent, then armies have to adopt skirmishers as the main line of battle rather than solid formations.

I'm a historical military buff, so fireball's presense causes me more psychological grief than 'raise dead'.


----------



## DandD (Mar 22, 2008)

Magic in general would cause serious changes on society, be it civilian or militarian.


----------



## robertliguori (Mar 22, 2008)

You want unfriendly to history?  Make a piece of wondrous architecture that casts Create Water at CL 1 continuously.  It costs 250 gp.  It provides 28,800 gallons of fresh, potable water every day.  Forever.  And it costs one-sixth as much as a suit of plate mail.


----------



## Celebrim (Mar 22, 2008)

robertliguori said:
			
		

> You want unfriendly to history?  Make a piece of wondrous architecture that casts Create Water at CL 1 continuously.  It costs 250 gp.  It provides 28,800 gallons of fresh, potable water every day.  Forever.  And it costs one-sixth as much as a suit of plate mail.




Yes, any sort of matter creation magic can be problimatic if you aren't careful.

But I think you over estimate the value of such an item to anyone that isn't a desert dweller.

Twenty-eight thousand gallons is approximately 1 inch of rainfall on a single acre of land.

For a spring, it is a miniscule daily flow.  Many springs have flows measures in the millions of gallons per day.

And there you start to get into the rub.  Because over time a society could build thousands of these things, eventually producing flows sufficient for good size rivers.  Where does all that water go?

Care must be taken on any matter creation spell lest the universe stop making sense.  This is something even JK Rowlings (who is anything but a gamer, witness Quidditch) seemed to recognize even though she put very few limitations on her magic otherwise.


----------



## Scrollreader (Mar 22, 2008)

I've always imagined that things like this were accounted for by the intersecting nature of the planes.  if you introduce a billion extra gallons of water a second, then somewhere on the prime material plane, in the deepest part of the oceans, a portal will eventually form to the elemental plane of water, that sucks out about a billion gallons of water per second (maybe a permanant whirlpool forms above, that sounds awesome).  I tend to think to have the planes 'self correct' at least in the long term, to maintain general stability, and keep my job as a DM easier.  Not to say that you couldn't flood a vast plain, or make a lake, or whatever.  But you're not going to flood the entire prime material plane.  Just my two cents, as a DM, of course.  It's somewhat harder to rationalize why iron is worth anything at all (given how easy it is to make walls of iron) in a world with high magic, or why people fear death, but I manage.  Still, anything that reduces the *default* approach to world shanging magic to make my job as a DM, or my expectations as a player more reasonable, is a good thing, IMO.  You can always houserule it if you want to change it, but making the default assumptions more clear is probably a good thing.


----------



## robertliguori (Mar 22, 2008)

Celebrim said:
			
		

> Yes, any sort of matter creation magic can be problimatic if you aren't careful.
> 
> But I think you over estimate the value of such an item to anyone that isn't a desert dweller.
> 
> ...




Rainfall?  **** rainfall.  There's magic for that.  Create Water is a nigh-perpetual source of water for drinking, cooking, and washing.  It is no more cholera, no more fevers.  It is one of the single greatest sources of infections and deaths in the pre-modern world eliminated, and, with a bit of piping and a gravity feed, can also be a source of power to turn water-wheels while providing running water.  Track down an engineer and ask what would happen if we could set up constant water-purification plants that required no notable energy input for the equivalent real-world cost of five pounds of gold.  Setting up these wells would save more lives than defeating any non-apocalyptic foe.

This is why I like simulationist gaming; instead of one person thinking "How might I make what is going on awesome?", you have everyone at the table doing so, throwing the full extent of their character's abilities at doing so, and end up with new and interesting awesome that you might not have considered.


----------



## Mirtek (Mar 22, 2008)

Clawhound said:
			
		

> Let's use a different piece of logic: if all you needed was a sword and armor, and you could go out and make fantastic amounts of money, why isn't everyone doing that? Why doesn't the entire population just get up and go treasure hunting? Why don't governments tax or seize discovered caches of treasure? Why don't dragons establish multinational corporations to multiply their assets?



Who says that they aren't doing exactly that?

_Tried to be an adventurer_ should be a very common cause of death for young farm lads if a couple of successfull adventures can earn them more than 25 years working the soil.

That's why things like the _Adventurer's Market_ make a lot of sense in D&D worlds (not only in the bigger cities but especialy in border hamlets).

Entire communities could be based around the _adventurer season_ when each year countless groups of young fools use the last hamlet at the border of the _adventurer zone_ as their base of operations for scouring the nearby mountain range for the big haul from the "lost ruins of XY". The whole hamlet's economy would be based around providing special adventuring services and for the adventurers it's just as difficult to keep their find secret from the other fortune seeker as it is making a find in the first place (imagine you're group finally discovered the entrance to the long lost tomb of king XY but since it was to late you returend to the basecamp to rest and prepare to enter tomorrow only to discover that somehow your disconvery wasn't as secret as you thought (mabye someone from annother party saw you discover the door) and 15 other groups have already entered) 

Same thing about governments. Sure as hell they will tax you if they catch you just returning loaded with gold you found on their territory. Dragon Magazine once had an inspiring article about exactly this topic (from bribing, buying official licenses with fixed tax rate, to smuggling your haul secretly to making friends with positions of power in the government to avoid taxation).


			
				Clawhound said:
			
		

> Answer: That's not a fun game.



I strongly disagree: That is a very fun game


----------



## MichaelK (Mar 22, 2008)

robertliguori said:
			
		

> Rainfall?  **** rainfall.  There's magic for that.  Create Water is a nigh-perpetual source of water for drinking, cooking, and washing.  It is no more cholera, no more fevers.  It is one of the single greatest sources of infections and deaths in the pre-modern world eliminated,




This is a detail I include in the campaign settings I create. I think a lower rate of infant mortality and a near-modern level of health and lifespan make a game much more enjoyable than the grim reality of medieval life.


----------



## Clawhound (Mar 22, 2008)

When I set forth my "why don't people do these other things..." examples, the point was not to say they were bad. My point was to show that there are many logical implications that we leave sitting on the table because to follow every logical implication in every direct leaves us with something that looks like nothing that we wanted.

In playing a setting, the DM sets forth a feel or an ideal of how the setting works. There are some things that he will allow, and there are some things that his internal sense of his game won't allow, no matter what the logic. There are some directions that the players see that they can go, but others that the players refuse to go because that direction does not fit their idea of the game that they are playing.

The advantage of a system where all directions are possible is that all directions are possible. However, not all directions are equally desirable.

For instance, I may choose to including Vikings in my 3e game. Naturally, by looking at what is optimal for my nature warriors, my Vikings should all go in the direction of druid/bears with tripping wolf companions because that would be the most optimal path for them to take. Yet, if they do that, I no longer have the Vikings that I wanted in the first place. Which do I choose? Do I choose the guys with axes or the guys with claws? There's no right answer there, but for any game, one is a better answer than the other. The unfavored answer will be left on the table. That unfavored answer may be possible for the players, but the game world won't follow it. The DM may make up a fluff reason to explain it, but the answer comes down to DM fiat.

Raise Dead works the exact same way. How it acts in the game is ultimately not an exercise in logic, but a decision by the DM about how the game world will act. The fiat may be overt or covert, but the answer is still DM fiat. Once that decision is made, then logic follows.


----------



## Delta (Mar 22, 2008)

Celebrim said:
			
		

> I'm a historical military buff, so fireball's presense causes me more psychological grief than 'raise dead'.




In general, I share your grief, but I've found solutions for this one that personally make me pretty comfortable. Granted that fireballs look a lot like cannon-fire on a battlefield (per Gygax in Chainmail):

(1) Mass troops tactics really did survive the existence of cannon for hundreds of years, depending on how you count it. At least from 12th Century through Civil War to WWI. I figure it's also the analog to Greek Fire in ancient times.
(2) Wizards are less mass-producible than firearms. They have to personally put themselves on the front line at great personal risk. That allows the campaign to say that they're too rare or too disagreeable to regularly appear on battlefields, or in numbers.
(3) There are also some magical counters that can be emphasized to greater or lesser extents, like Counterspelling or a _rod of flame extinguishing_.
(4) In addition, it's possible that _fireball_ is not so common a spell as to be in every wizard's spellbook.

I find that wizard-spell problems can generally be massaged by tweaking the frequency of wizards or the particular spell in the campaign. It's a much more cutting problem for cleric-spells where (a) every known church in the world is full of clerics, (b) every cleric has access to every possible spell, and (c) the spell is generally applied within a safe sanctuary, at no risk to the cleric in question.

As time goes on, clerics bug me more and more in comparison to any other class.


----------



## Mirtek (Mar 22, 2008)

Delta said:
			
		

> (b) every cleric has access to every possible spell, and (c) the spell is generally applied within a safe sanctuary, at no risk to the cleric in question.



d) while every cleric theoretically is able to access every possible spell he still needs to request it from his deity who can simply deny the spell


----------



## Celebrim (Mar 22, 2008)

robertliguori said:
			
		

> Rainfall?  **** rainfall.  There's magic for that.  Create Water is a nigh-perpetual source of water for drinking, cooking, and washing.  It is no more cholera, no more fevers.




Not really.  The problem is that a source of water isn't enough.  You also have to have a water distribution system.  Cholera epidemics have broken out in the third world that had access to clean drinking water because the buckets being used to bring the water from the spigot to the homes were tainted with residue from cleaning up after other sufferers.

Besides which, disease is a literal malevolent spirit in my campaign world.  It doesn't have to obey physical laws.  A disease spirit could possess your magical fountain and then it would produce diseased water.  In fact, it very likely _would_ be possessed by a disease spirit because being artificial, it has no natural water spirit to defend it.  So, you build a magical fountain, and the first thing you learn is that upkeep of that fountain involves reutinely hallowing it to keep evil spirits away.

Cholera is particularly bad, because Chorlera in its incarnation as 'the Red Death' is one of the seven greater disease spirits in the service of the Elder God Morgul, Lord of Rot.  If Cholera really wanted to inhabit your magical fountain, driving it out would require heroes of the highest order (probably not less than 18th level).



> It is one of the single greatest sources of infections and deaths in the pre-modern world eliminated, and, with a bit of piping and a gravity feed, can also be a source of power to turn water-wheels while providing running water.  Track down an engineer and ask what would happen if we could set up constant water-purification plants that required no notable energy input for the equivalent real-world cost of five pounds of gold.  Setting up these wells would save more lives than defeating any non-apocalyptic foe.




That's what you get for hiring an engineer to do a wizard's work.

I always warn my players, before you do anything that sounds new or cool, do some research to figure out why your obvious idea hasn't been tried before.  Sartha has a 30,000 year written history.  It's highly unlikely you are the first to try anything.  History is littered with the corpses of young wizards that thought they had a great idea.  And that's if they were lucky.


----------



## Celebrim (Mar 22, 2008)

Delta said:
			
		

> In general, I share your grief, but I've found solutions for this one that personally make me pretty comfortable.




I have used several similar solutions, but I have pretty extensive mass combat experience with D&D worlds and I've always found that whatever magic is available is generally the decisive element.  This isn't so bad when the PC's are the source of that magic, but when its NPCs it grates - and it further grates when it suggests that certain specific tactics (pike formations and massed heavy cavalry) are simply unfeasible and largely have to be written out of your world's history.  I recognize that historically effective fighting forces were generally much more mixed arms than romantic conceptions of them tend to be, but even so it tends to make armies of my world much more uniform than I would like them to be.  All of them have to have sizable effective massed missile and skirmisher screens simply to deal with the possibility of enemy spellcasters.  The Welsh all longbow army survives as does the Mogul light cavalry, and Byzantine Cataphracts (in at least the mixed bow and lance form), but the classic Spartan heavy Infantry, Imperial Roman legion, and Polish Hussars are in trouble.  I have sorta solved the problem by having a few legendary mercenary units who have cobbled together enough magical items to fight in close formation (the Black Swords being the most notable), but still - its a constraint I'm unhappy with.


----------



## Delta (Mar 22, 2008)

Mirtek said:
			
		

> d) while every cleric theoretically is able to access every possible spell he still needs to request it from his deity who can simply deny the spell




That's simply not in the rules as written.


----------



## Just Another User (Mar 22, 2008)

Delta said:
			
		

> I find that wizard-spell problems can generally be massaged by tweaking the frequency of wizards or the particular spell in the campaign. It's a much more cutting problem for cleric-spells where (a) every known church in the world is full of clerics, (b) every cleric has access to every possible spell, and (c) the spell is generally applied within a safe sanctuary, at no risk to the cleric in question.
> 
> As time goes on, clerics bug me more and more in comparison to any other class.




While b) and c) are usually true, a) don't need to be, see Eberron as a great example, where priests of a religion are actually experts focused in the diplomacy and knowledge (religion) skills, with some rare adept and some exceptionally rare Cleric.


----------



## robertliguori (Mar 22, 2008)

Celebrim said:
			
		

> Not really.  The problem is that a source of water isn't enough.  You also have to have a water distribution system.  Cholera epidemics have broken out in the third world that had access to clean drinking water because the buckets being used to bring the water from the spigot to the homes were tainted with residue from cleaning up after other sufferers.
> 
> Besides which, disease is a literal malevolent spirit in my campaign world.  It doesn't have to obey physical laws.  A disease spirit could possess your magical fountain and then it would produce diseased water.  In fact, it very likely _would_ be possessed by a disease spirit because being artificial, it has no natural water spirit to defend it.  So, you build a magical fountain, and the first thing you learn is that upkeep of that fountain involves reutinely hallowing it to keep evil spirits away.
> 
> Cholera is particularly bad, because Chorlera in its incarnation as 'the Red Death' is one of the seven greater disease spirits in the service of the Elder God Morgul, Lord of Rot.  If Cholera really wanted to inhabit your magical fountain, driving it out would require heroes of the highest order (probably not less than 18th level).



Who cares about driving it out? People have wonderful personal-level cholera-demon-exorcism systems; they're called immune systems.  The trick is to keep victims from dehydrating before death happens.  In this case, assuming we don't have wondrous architecture of Cure Disease readily available, we can double our price and throw on a Purify Food and Drink effect. With a little jiggling of areas-of-effect, we now have guaranteed-potable water and retroactive refrigeration.  That disease spirit can hang around all it wants; the water coming out of the fountain is guaranteed by the nature of magic itself to contain no vectors for disease.

The sanitation issue with improperly-cleaned buckets is a problem; this is why plumbing would be of vital importance, and also why wondrous architecture of prestidigitation and a designated cleaner would also be a worthwhile investment for a village.  We're at 750 gp for the whole shebang, and as long as it's properly used, natural disease spread will be virtually eliminated.  It won't stop powerful outsiders from going around casting Contagion, as you mention, but if disease is only something that happens when a specific outsider makes it happen, then it's not a major source of death, and you don't have to worry about trying to cure it.

(If it were a major source of death, you can set up a more-expensive rig; wondrous architecture that Planar-Binds plague demons and then never interacts with them, thus denying them the possibility of escape.  There are many places to set something like this up; at an undersea observation post in Lunia would give quite effective results.)



> That's what you get for hiring an engineer to do a wizard's work.
> 
> I always warn my players, before you do anything that sounds new or cool, do some research to figure out why your obvious idea hasn't been tried before.  Sartha has a 30,000 year written history.  It's highly unlikely you are the first to try anything.  History is littered with the corpses of young wizards that thought they had a great idea.  And that's if they were lucky.



Yes, it's possible that I might discover a wholly-undiscovered effect or synchronicity that leads to my plan breaking down...but I might also accidentally summon Great Ctuthlu tomorrow during tea when I ask my adventuring buddy to pass the sugar.  Either there are basic principles of the universe that can be understood (and therefore exploited), or everything could explode tomorrow anyway, and there's no reason not to try your revolutionary new Undead Postal System.

That's the thing about side effects; rare is the flaw in a process that cannot be turned into an effective, desired output under certain circumstances.  Your unnatural and unholy experiments haven't failed at discovering a way to save peasants; you've just discovered a new and interesting way to massacre that incoming orc horde.


----------



## Amphimir Míriel (Mar 23, 2008)

Just Another User said:
			
		

> Even being a king could not be enough, kings have heirs, one die, another one is made, but unless the king is needed alive right here, right now or something Really Bad(TM) happen the church would refuse to raise him.




Heh, forget _Raise Dead_, what about _Cure Disease_ and _Cure X Wounds_ spells?

Take a look at modern-day monarchy... Charles, Prince of Wales will be 60 years old next November*... Does he seem to fit the image of the "young, dashing Heir-Apparent"? 
Now that we have modern medicine, a healthy, lucid 82 year old lady (Queen Elizabeth) is not such a rare occurrence, at least on developed countries.

The point is that, if you think about it hard enough, almost any kind of magic will have social and political consequences... So almost all mid&high-fantasy settings need some serious hand-waving in order to function according to trope.



* According to Wikipedia


----------



## Just Another User (Mar 23, 2008)

Amphimir Míriel said:
			
		

> Heh, forget _Raise Dead_, what about _Cure Disease_ and _Cure X Wounds_ spells?
> 
> Take a look at modern-day monarchy... Charles, Prince of Wales will be 60 years old next November*... Does he seem to fit the image of the "young, dashing Heir-Apparent"?
> Now that we have modern medicine, a healthy, lucid 82 year old lady (Queen Elizabeth) is not such a rare occurrence, at least on developed countries.
> ...




No, I think raise dead is a can of worms on his own, after all wounds heal naturally and people can heal from diesase without magic, magic only make it faster and more certain, but there are no mundane ways to come back from death, you can insert cure disease and CW spells in a setting without changing it too much, sure you must still do a little handwaving, but not on the same intesnity of the handwaving you need for raise dead.

And what I said for raise dead count for the other spells, even if not at the same level, spells are (literally) gifts from the gods, you should not abuse them*, someone is wounded? unless it is a life threatening wounds he can just wait for it to heal naturally, unless there are more pressing reasons there is no need to use magic for it. The same for cure disease, with the aggravation that priests able to cast it are quite uncommon. And for all the spells there is the point that a cleric will not use them on anybody, are you a follower of his religion? or at the very least are your goals common to his religion? A cleric will use his spells first for the members of his comunity,then for member of his religion from outside his comunity, then on everyone else, if at all and more probably not, if you go to him searching for healing he would gladly use a Heal check on you, even free of charge, but unless you give him a "damn, good reason"(tm)** he would not use his god's gifts on you.

* in 2nd edition this was explicitely put in the rules, if you used your spells in a way that your god would have disapproved he could cut you from his maigc for a while. Pity they forgot to even put it as an option in 3.x

**what is a good reason is open to interpretation, of course, being a member of his religion is a good one, "We have saved/are going to save the village from the goblin raiders" or something like that, usually works, too. Money could either works or make the priest very angry.


----------



## BryonD (Mar 23, 2008)

Amphimir Míriel said:
			
		

> The point is that, if you think about it hard enough, almost any kind of magic will have social and political consequences... So almost all mid&high-fantasy settings need some serious hand-waving in order to function according to trope.



I agree.  And that includes the 4e version of raise dead.  I don't buy that telling a peasant his wife can't be raised be she was of no consequence, and had no "destiny" would stop a riot any more than saying she can't be raised because there are no diamonds available.  So you are exactly right, some hand waving is pretty much always going to be mandated.

But it is not a black and white issue.  You can take simulation to far and get to the point that nothing flows and you can take gamism to far and get to the point that nothing makes sense.  But there is a very wide middle ground.  As several WotC people have stated, 4e moves along that middle ground toward the gamism side.  And it is ok that a lot of people like that.  It is also ok that a lot of people don't.  

There is a vast difference between wanting the on screen elements of the game to make sense and letting off screen stuff simply be understood boundary conditions that are hand waved.  And that doesn't remotely undermine simulation.  Anyone who thinks it does doesn't understand simulation.  

It is amazing to me the people in this thread who for some internal reason can't simply state that they prefer gamism.  Instead they seem somehow oddly compelled to repeatedly attempt to force an absurd polarized mischaracterization of what simulation means onto the topic.  It really makes one wonder why they need to make a bunch of badwrongfun assaults on the idea.  If they were comfortable with their desire for simplicity, it seems they would just go along and play it their way.

Quite simply, 3e was a more simulationist game.  If you are a pro-4e fan and you want to dispute that, then you are disputing WotC.  And another fact, 3e was a very popular system that did really well with a lot of people.  An honest open-minded view of simulation shows that it can and has worked and been highly popular and successful.  But anyone trapped forcing all-or-nothing on it will never be able to grasp that.


----------



## Lackhand (Mar 23, 2008)

BryonD said:
			
		

> I agree.  And that includes the 4e version of raise dead.  I don't buy that telling a peasant his wife can't be raised be she was of no consequence, and had no "destiny" would stop a riot any more than saying she can't be raised because there are no diamonds available.  So you are exactly right, some hand waving is pretty much always going to be mandated.
> <snip a bunch of stuff I agree with>



Wait, what?
You don't believe that saying to the (grieving) relatives of the dead woman that she can't be raised via this ritual, the only way to reunite the husband with his wife would be by a) storming the gates of the land of the dead and searching there for her shade, or b) the easy road?

I mean, "the laws of nature prohibit it" is usually a pretty good show stopper. Nobody (in game)'s going to be happy about the fact that the wife remains inert, but there are different ways of spinning this, out of game.
Imagine that there is a ritual that is performed at funerals that keeps the corpse fresh -- it keep rot from the coffin for a year, and ensures that the spirit of the slain travels swiftly to its just reward.
In one out of a gajillion instances, however, the ritual causes the corpse to stand up and return to life, healed of all injury and in the bloom of life. This isn't by chance; it happens only in times of great events and mortal struggle, and anyone who returns to life via this method will return over and over and over again until their role in the great struggle is complete.

What is there there to riot over? The priest _did_ the ritual. Nothing more to say. You might riot anyway -- people sometimes riot over things which in retrospect seem like terrible catalysts -- but then we're talking high melodrama, and this is hardly campaign warping.


----------



## bramadan (Mar 23, 2008)

Trying to wrap even remotely believable medievalesque world around DnD3 rules was what killed my desire to play that edition ever again.

Between immortal merchants/kings, invisible flying wizards, instant communications, travel that is either instant or incredibly safe (rope trick), scrying magic, streets better lit then in 19th century London, cheap permanent running water, endless source of iron and other base metals, ever plentiful crops and no epidemic disease the feel for the world got lost somewhere.

I am overjoyed that DnD4 is taking steps to make it easier for DMs to make worlds that conform to some accepted fantasy tropes and not late 20th century wonderland with swords.


----------



## Celebrim (Mar 23, 2008)

bramadan said:
			
		

> I am overjoyed that DnD4 is taking steps to make it easier for DMs to make worlds that conform to some accepted fantasy tropes and not late 20th century wonderland with swords.




I can't say that I've seen a single thing about 4e that makes me think that.  I simply see no sign that making the game have greater realism or even high fantasy versimlitude was even a consideration in the design.


----------



## zoroaster100 (Mar 23, 2008)

I don't know if it is the major consideration for the design decisions, or even a factor in those decisions, but the result of the 4E changes which make flying, invisibility, etc. less accessible to low level characters does absolutely help me in creating a world that is more in line with my vision for a fantasy roleplaying game.


----------



## DandD (Mar 23, 2008)

However, the implied setting and world-building stuff is all about really fantastical stuff and extravagant landscapes, so yeah, even if the player characters won't get fly, infinite water and teleportation at low levels, doesn't mean that the world won't still have that stuff either. The Implied "Points of Light"-setting (or more precisely, concept) is about a world where the last big civilisation just collapsed, and now all the marvels and high magic technology stuff lies in ruins and everybody has to fend for itself. 

Aside from that, Raise Dead still sucks in every edition of D&D.


----------



## bramadan (Mar 25, 2008)

Celebrim said:
			
		

> I can't say that I've seen a single thing about 4e that makes me think that.  I simply see no sign that making the game have greater realism or even high fantasy versimlitude was even a consideration in the design.




We must have bone with different aspects of DnD3 then.
To me, pushing magical flight and invisibility well into the paragon tier (from very low in DnD3) is just a thing to improve the verisimilitude. Likewise for the new philosophy around Raise Dead. I have hope that charm and other mind-control effects will be likewise toned down and pushed to higher levels (at least in the core). Between those three, and maybe scrying most of my main "atmosphere" gripes are addressed.


----------



## Fobok (Mar 25, 2008)

bramadan said:
			
		

> We must have bone with different aspects of DnD3 then.
> To me, pushing magical flight and invisibility well into the paragon tier (from very low in DnD3) is just a thing to improve the verisimilitude. Likewise for the new philosophy around Raise Dead. I have hope that charm and other mind-control effects will be likewise toned down and pushed to higher levels (at least in the core). Between those three, and maybe scrying most of my main "atmosphere" gripes are addressed.




Races and Classes made a pretty good case that they were toned down in core, at least... they wanted psionics to specialize in that kind of effect, so toned it down on the Wizard spell list.


----------



## Warbringer (Mar 25, 2008)

Celebrim said:
			
		

> Yes, any sort of matter creation magic can be problimatic if you aren't careful.
> 
> But I think you over estimate the value of such an item to anyone that isn't a desert dweller




And I think you underestimate the importance of clean water in a medieval situation were sanitry conditions kill more people than all other conditions combined. Even something as simple as cleaning a wound or bathing a baby.


----------



## Warbringer (Mar 25, 2008)

Celebrim said:
			
		

> I'm a historical military buff, so fireball's presense causes me more psychological grief than 'raise dead'.




I've always played, and believed, that fantasy warfare has far more in common with mid World War I military tactics than anything from the late medieval/ren. periods.

All that flying and gas and fire and mass damage....

trench warfare baby is the stalemate of any great fanatsy war


----------



## Celebrim (Mar 25, 2008)

Warbringer said:
			
		

> And I think you underestimate the importance of clean water in a medieval situation were sanitry conditions kill more people than all other conditions combined. Even something as simple as cleaning a wound or bathing a baby.




And I think you underestimate the importance of the germ theory of disease.


----------



## Celebrim (Mar 25, 2008)

Warbringer said:
			
		

> I've always played, and believed, that fantasy warfare has far more in common with mid World War I military tactics than anything from the late medieval/ren. periods.
> 
> All that flying and gas and fire and mass damage....
> 
> trench warfare baby is the stalemate of any great fanatsy war




If there is one thing 30 years of dungeoneering ought to have taught us, it is that there is no such thing as a safe static position in fantasy warfare.


----------



## Fallen Seraph (Mar 25, 2008)

It is funny actually that you mention this, once I am done with my Reality-Bending, Horror-Noir-Suspense Campaign. I plan on doing either a Egyptian/Romanesque Campaign or a Eberronesque Campaign World where trench warfare is common way of doing warfare.

They have trenches with wards and magic-shields over them, "firearms" that destroy wands to release a potent bolt of magic, reanimated animal corpses strapped to magically reinforced landships with more potent "firearms", etc.


----------



## Aenghus (Mar 25, 2008)

A DM's feel for his game setting is not necessarily coloured by the ruleset he uses, as each DM approaches the rules in a different way. For those who do like the rules to support the way events in the setting unfold this is useful. 

The attitudes of the players to the consistency of the setting are also an issue, and this rule can help in this regard as well, assuming it is presented in a constructive fashion.

Moving back to the idea of the bereaved NPC peasant whose wife has died, I would generally prefer a world where the possibility of actual resurrection never even occurs to him. He may implore the gods to bring her back, but doesn't expect that to happen.

In the light of the 4e resurrection rule I see the typical reaction being more like a third world peasant whose wife is sick and needs an organ transplant. Maybe expensive high-tech western medicine could save her but he doesn't know anyone who has been similarly saved personally, and neither does anyone in his village. Nor could his entire village afford the cost of either the transport or the treatment itself, and there is no guarantee that it would work. 

The above analogy is of limited use, as for the fantasy peasant there is no tv, internet or phones, he's almost certainly illiterate and dependent on word of mouth and stories to learn anything.

Players and their PCs should be less blasé about resurrection magic in 4e, at low to mid levels, but some thought is still needed. Giving more conscientious PCs something substantive to say IC when bereaved NPCs beg them for aid is something that the DM should address when using this rule.


----------



## Majoru Oakheart (Mar 25, 2008)

Aenghus said:
			
		

> In the light of the 4e resurrection rule I see the typical reaction being more like a third world peasant whose wife is sick and needs an organ transplant. Maybe expensive high-tech western medicine could save her but he doesn't know anyone who has been similarly saved personally, and neither does anyone in his village. Nor could his entire village afford the cost of either the transport or the treatment itself, and there is no guarantee that it would work.
> 
> The above analogy is of limited use, as for the fantasy peasant there is no tv, internet or phones, he's almost certainly illiterate and dependent on word of mouth and stories to learn anything.



The idea is that in the default D&D world that only "recently" a human nation that spanned almost the whole world (or continent) has fallen.  Before that, they lasted a long time.  Long enough to create roads all over the land, promote trade for hundreds or thousands of years, spread knowledge and magic all over the place, and so on.

When this kingdom fell, it left cities or states to fend for themselves without an overreaching government in place to support them anymore.  Some fell themselves, leaving large areas of land without a government at all, but with the people still living there.

These people remember when there were people around who could bring back the dead.  There might even be a couple of people left in their towns/villages who have the knowledge to do so.  Either that or they know of a nearby city where it can be done.

The world may not have the internet, cell phones, and the like.  It does have sending stones capable of instantly transmitting messages from one side of the planet to the other.  Even assuming you don't want such a thing to be common, most D&D worlds do have one major factor over the real world:  Thousands and thousands of years of history at about the same "technology" level.

In the default world, the tieflings had an empire spanning half the world for thousands of years where they were capable of bringing back the dead all the time.  So did the dragonborn.  So did the humans.  Plus, there were older empires that were even more grand.

Unlike the modern day world where the ability to actually save someone from most diseases has been around only for the last 100 years, the ability to magically cure disease, wounds, even death has been around 10,000 to 20,000 years.  And it has touched nearly every place on the planet at least 4 or 5 times.

I certainly see it as something almost everyone in the world has at least heard of being a possibility.  The knowledge to do so may even be passed down from generation to generation.  It is likely filled with rumors and half forgotten truths.  People might(wrongly) believe that only royalty can come back to life or that only those in the prime of their life can return.


----------



## Aenghus (Mar 25, 2008)

re resurrection magic


			
				Majoru Oakheart said:
			
		

> ...
> I certainly see it as something almost everyone in the world has at least heard of being a possibility.  The knowledge to do so may even be passed down from generation to generation.  It is likely filled with rumors and half forgotten truths.  People might(wrongly) believe that only royalty can come back to life or that only those in the prime of their life can return.




My comments were in the light of the new 4e rules on resurrection magic, where it no longer works on everyone automatically. From what has been announced so far, resurrection won't work on people in the heroic tier (1st-10th level) and is difficult to access for those in the paragon tier (11-20th).  This puts it forever past the reach of peasants and low level NPCs, regardles of how rich or influential. Direct divine intervention could do it, but this seems to be less common in the 4e take on things as well.


*Change the rules, and you change the world.*


(Well, I'm not as literal about ruiles as I used to be, but still think this way).

Change is much easier when starting a campaign from scratch in a new world. Changing an existing world can be more difficult, especially if major events depend on the the exact functioning of the old rules.


----------



## Clawhound (Mar 25, 2008)

That's where your conception of modeling is important. If your physics is based on the rules, then you have an issue. If your physics is based on some setting ideal, then a change in the rules only changes how any particular event is modeled.

Thus, why settings are drifting into fluff territory, as settings have an internal integrity different from the rules base.


----------



## Man in the Funny Hat (Mar 25, 2008)

Stalker0 said:
			
		

> "You can only be raised if you have an unfulfilled destiny."



Just wanted to note that I've been suggesting this for... well, a couple years now.  Specifically that all ability to resurrect the dead has never been intended as anything but an in-game means of achieving the meta-game goal of not letting a PC death destroy the fun or dynamics of a campaign.  By simply letting the DM assert that any NPC is resurrected only if he wants to let him be resurrected to MAINTAIN a plot line or campaign structure, thus preventing resurrection from being UNIVERSALLY applied to every Tom, Dick, and Harry and collapsing a game world under the broken logic of it.

DM fiat?  Of COURSE it is.  As long as players continue to decide for themselves whether their PC "has a destiny to fulfull", the DM gets to limit it's logical use beyond the PC's only insofar as he sees fit.  I don't see how ANYONE could have cause to complain about this.  ASSUMING that the DM does not get to decide this success or failure for PC's (beyond mere availability of such magic) it simply puts into written form what a lot of myopic DM's should have recognized long ago.  Most problems with resurrection magic were really with its application BEYOND the PC's, not WITH the PC's.


----------



## Dausuul (Mar 25, 2008)

Aenghus said:
			
		

> My comments were in the light of the new 4e rules on resurrection magic, where it no longer works on everyone automatically. From what has been announced so far, resurrection won't work on people in the heroic tier (1st-10th level) and is difficult to access for those in the paragon tier (11-20th).  This puts it forever past the reach of peasants and low level NPCs, regardles of how rich or influential. Direct divine intervention could do it, but this seems to be less common in the 4e take on things as well.




Can you link to anything indicating there is an actual rule that resurrection magic doesn't work on Heroic-tier characters?  I know we've been told that if your character dies in Heroic tier, you roll up a new one--but that doesn't mean resurrection is impossible for such characters, just that it's not something you expect to have available at that level.

If your 1st-level character dies in 3.5E, there's no rule saying _raise dead_ won't work on him, but between the hefty material component and the need to find a 9th-level cleric, it's still pretty unrealistic to expect to get him rezzed.


----------



## hong (Mar 25, 2008)

Aenghus said:
			
		

> Moving back to the idea of the bereaved NPC peasant whose wife has died, I would generally prefer a world where the possibility of actual resurrection never even occurs to him. He may implore the gods to bring her back, but doesn't expect that to happen.
> 
> In the light of the 4e resurrection rule I see the typical reaction being more like a third world peasant whose wife is sick and needs an organ transplant. Maybe expensive high-tech western medicine could save her but he doesn't know anyone who has been similarly saved personally, and neither does anyone in his village. Nor could his entire village afford the cost of either the transport or the treatment itself, and there is no guarantee that it would work.




If you could handle it in 3E, you can handle it in 4E. If anything, 4E is closer to what you're after than 3E.


----------



## Majoru Oakheart (Mar 25, 2008)

Aenghus said:
			
		

> My comments were in the light of the new 4e rules on resurrection magic, where it no longer works on everyone automatically. From what has been announced so far, resurrection won't work on people in the heroic tier (1st-10th level) and is difficult to access for those in the paragon tier (11-20th).  This puts it forever past the reach of peasants and low level NPCs, regardles of how rich or influential. Direct divine intervention could do it, but this seems to be less common in the 4e take on things as well.



You assume too much about what you don't know yet.



			
				Aenghus said:
			
		

> Change is much easier when starting a campaign from scratch in a new world. Changing an existing world can be more difficult, especially if major events depend on the the exact functioning of the old rules.



True.  And I think this is one of the (many) good reasons to start a new campaign with 4e rather than try to convert an old one.  The paradigm is different and it creates a slightly different functioning world.


----------



## Storm-Bringer (Mar 26, 2008)

I am still having a problem seeing the difference between "NPCs are raised if the DM says so" and "NPCs can't be raised unless the DM says so".

Was there a problem with NPCs running around behind your back getting raised from the dead when you weren't looking?


----------



## Kwalish Kid (Mar 26, 2008)

Celebrim said:
			
		

> And I think you underestimate the importance of the germ theory of disease.



The importance of clean water is not incompatible with the germ theory of disease. Indeed, if one believes in the germ theory of disease, one has every reason to support access to clean water.

There is little doubt that cholera is caused by a germ. There is also little doubt that the cause of developing cholera for most people, historically, was their social status when this status was instrumental to their access to clean water.


----------



## Lackhand (Mar 26, 2008)

Storm-Bringer said:
			
		

> I am still having a problem seeing the difference between "NPCs are raised if the DM says so" and "NPCs can't be raised unless the DM says so".
> 
> Was there a problem with NPCs running around behind your back getting raised from the dead when you weren't looking?



I would rather have to work to explain precisely why person A was able to be raised from the dead...
... than have to work to explain why person B resolutely refuses to be raised from the dead.


----------



## Storm-Bringer (Mar 26, 2008)

Lackhand said:
			
		

> I would rather have to work to explain precisely why person A was able to be raised from the dead...
> ... than have to work to explain why person B resolutely refuses to be raised from the dead.



But in the end, as the effort is roughly the same, what is the difference?

3.x and prior have quite clearcut reasons and rules why it wouldn't work in every single instance.  Being codified in the ruleset isn't something new.  It can even be a springboard or a red herring, if the DM wants.  The DM could decide ahead of time that a certain NPC can't be raised for whatever plot related reasons.  The PCs get wind of it, are puzzled that they weren't raised, and truck on over with their handy-dandy Cleric to raise the NPC and grab a bit of coin.  Lo and behold, it doesn't work!  Do they follow up with trying to figure out why?  Is that central to the plot, or a device to get the characters onto the real plot?  Is the upcoming adventure to retrieve that person's 'soul' from the afterlife?  Possibly to convince that person to come back?  Maybe the NPC had a critical piece of information, and since they can't be raised or contacted on the other plane, the players have to find a way to get to them.

If NPCs can't be raised as a matter of course, then these few plot hooks among dozens of others aren't going to occur.

There is no change from previous editions.  It has always been up to the DM as to whether or not NPCs are raised.


----------



## Lacyon (Mar 26, 2008)

Storm-Bringer said:
			
		

> But in the end, as the effort is roughly the same, what is the difference?




Why would it be the same amount of effort to explain why every raisable NPC is not raised as it is to explain why one particular NPC is raised?


----------



## Lackhand (Mar 26, 2008)

Storm-Bringer said:
			
		

> But in the end, as the effort is roughly the same, what is the difference?
> 
> 3.x and prior have quite clearcut reasons and rules why it wouldn't work in every single instance.  Being codified in the ruleset isn't something new.  It can even be a springboard or a red herring, if the DM wants.  The DM could decide ahead of time that a certain NPC can't be raised for whatever plot related reasons.  The PCs get wind of it, are puzzled that they weren't raised, and truck on over with their handy-dandy Cleric to raise the NPC and grab a bit of coin.  Lo and behold, it doesn't work!  Do they follow up with trying to figure out why?  Is that central to the plot, or a device to get the characters onto the real plot?  Is the upcoming adventure to retrieve that person's 'soul' from the afterlife?  Possibly to convince that person to come back?  Maybe the NPC had a critical piece of information, and since they can't be raised or contacted on the other plane, the players have to find a way to get to them.
> 
> ...



Easy question! The effort _isn't_ the same. This is a change from previous editions.

Without house rules, there are only a few conditions where some cleric actually in possession of both a corpse and a sufficient quantity of diamonds can't raise (or resurrect) the body.
To the best of my knowledge, these are:
1) The person isn't actually dead. They're alive somewhere, Magic Jar'd, simulacrum'd, or otherwise magicked out the yin-yang already.
2) The person died of old age.
3) The person died of death magic -- this can still be circumvented, but it takes even more mojo.
4) The person doesn't want to come back.

Rules as writ, that's it. That doesn't describe a large portion of the population (of death) -- most dead folk in a D&D campaign, given the cash, probably didn't die from death magic and would probably like to keep living, please. Thus cash is the limit; this means that those with sufficient wealth logically and necessarily must live foreverish.

4e takes that list, and appends to it one very important additional item:
5) They're not special enough. Before you check any of the other options, check this one! Most people _aren't_ special enough; only explore the effects of immortality on society if you decide that everyone has enough fate to keep coming back.


----------



## Celebrim (Mar 26, 2008)

Kwalish Kid said:
			
		

> The importance of clean water is not incompatible with the germ theory of disease. Indeed, if one believes in the germ theory of disease, one has every reason to support access to clean water.




I think you are missing my point - knowing the germ theory of disease is more important than access to clean water.  The great mass of people who died didn't die for lack of clean water, they died because they didn't know what caused disease.  If they had have known, they probably would have paid more attention to obtaining clean water, boiling water before drinking it, hygiene, waste disposal, and so forth.  The great mass of ancients weren't dying of Cholera, which is a relatively new thing.  They were dying of dysentary and small pox, bubonic plague and typhus, influenza and scarlet fever.  Clean water would have helped, but not as much as knowing what caused diseases.  Hense, my suggestion that magical water in itself would mainly be valuable where it would otherwise be difficult to obtain water.  Like the purification system is mainly valuable in cases where the threat of rapid recontamination is low.

There is no reason to think that fantasy inhabitants don't know what causes disease within thier own world.



> There is little doubt that cholera is caused by a germ.




In a fantasy world?  No, I think that is greatly in doubt.  I've already stated that cholera is not caused by a germ in my homebrew.  It's caused by a malevolent spirit (or spirits).  Those spirits are attracted to and strengthened by filth and bad odors (which also drive away beneficial protective spirits).


----------



## robertliguori (Mar 26, 2008)

Celebrim said:
			
		

> I think you are missing my point - knowing the germ theory of disease is more important than access to clean water.  The great mass of people who died didn't die for lack of clean water, they died because they didn't know what caused disease.  If they had have known, they probably would have paid more attention to obtaining clean water, boiling water before drinking it, hygiene, waste disposal, and so forth.  The great mass of ancients weren't dying of Cholera, which is a relatively new thing.  They were dying of dysentary and small pox, bubonic plague and typhus, influenza and scarlet fever.  Clean water would have helped, but not as much as knowing what caused diseases.  Hense, my suggestion that magical water in itself would mainly be valuable where it would otherwise be difficult to obtain water.  Like the purification system is mainly valuable in cases where the threat of rapid recontamination is low.
> 
> There is no reason to think that fantasy inhabitants don't know what causes disease within thier own world.



Given the existence of random-knowledge magic, it doesn't matter if any sentient entity knows about germs.  If you can word divinations to get answers back along the lines of "You can fight the plague by boiling water before it's drunk, salting and covering meat, and avoid these other conditions.", then you can get knowledge-esque results, whether you're facing natural plague or demons that just happen to act like bacteria.



> In a fantasy world?  No, I think that is greatly in doubt.  I've already stated that cholera is not caused by a germ in my homebrew.  It's caused by a malevolent spirit (or spirits).  Those spirits are attracted to and strengthened by filth and bad odors (which also drive away beneficial protective spirits).



This is an interesting wrinkle.  Presumably, you can cure disease simply by murdering or driving out the malevolent spirit, or just by dumping the afflicted or infected into an antimagic field, yes?  Do you have spells like Trap Possessor from BoVD that would make an infected person permanently ill, but no longer contagious?  Also, presumably you can consecrate the heck out of a hospital area and treat the afflicted without worry of either secondary infection or contagion?

This is one of the reasons I like D&D: it lets you take folkloric beliefs like "Diseases are caused by evil spirits." then let you stat up the spirits and run the world, and see how it turns out and what needs to be tweaked to achieve folkloric results.  (No level 10+ adventurers is a pretty good start.)


----------



## Celebrim (Mar 27, 2008)

robertliguori said:
			
		

> Presumably, you can cure disease simply by murdering or driving out the malevolent spirit...




Yes, exactly that.  If you are a cleric, you just request your deity get the deed done.  Otherwise, you could potentially go ethereal and kill the disease, or you could summon a spirit up that could fight it, or you could try to corner it in a nightmare and kill it there.  The latter is what witch doctors do.    



> ...or just by dumping the afflicted or infected into an antimagic field, yes?




No.  Natural magic like that which animates spirits is unaffected by antimagic fields.  You'd have to dump the afflicted in an anti-life field to kill it, and the disease is more resistant to that than the person is.  On the other hand, you could put the person in a positive energy field, and the person is more resistant to that than the disease is.  Of course, unless you had some way to anchor it down, the disease would probably just flee.



> Do you have spells like Trap Possessor from BoVD that would make an infected person permanently ill, but no longer contagious?




It's never come up, but yeah, you could potentially do that.



> Also, presumably you can consecrate the heck out of a hospital area and treat the afflicted without worry of either secondary infection or contagion?




Yes.  Over course, the consecration process would first involve cleansing the effected area physically as a necessary step to spiritual cleansing (good spirits don't have much power over filth and foulness), but its not germs you are killing or keeping away.  (Although you'd have to be a scholar of the arcane to really notice differences between germs and your typical mindless least disease spirits in practice.  It's one thing to suggest that at some fundamental 'quantum' level the universe is running on a different engine, it's quite another thing to try to run a game where everyday events aren't familiar to the people at the table.  I'm not sure my imagination is up to it.  Besides, my past experience is that if the universe is too foreign, you waste too much time in exposition trying to get the players up to speed.)


----------



## Steely Dan (Mar 27, 2008)

Aenghus said:
			
		

> *Change the rules, and you change the world.*




I totally disagree with this opinion; you can run a Toril or Athas or Eberron etc campaign, regardless of the rules system you are using.


----------



## VannATLC (Mar 27, 2008)

Celebrim said:
			
		

> Yes.  Over course, the consecration process would first involve cleansing the effected area physically as a necessary step to spiritual cleansing (good spirits don't have much power over filth and foulness), but its not germs you are killing or keeping away.  (Although you'd have to be a scholar of the arcane to really notice differences between germs and your typical mindless least disease spirits in practice.  It's one thing to suggest that at some fundamental 'quantum' level the universe is running on a different engine, it's quite another thing to try to run a game where everyday events aren't familiar to the people at the table.  I'm not sure my imagination is up to it.  Besides, my past experience is that if the universe is too foreign, you waste too much time in exposition trying to get the players up to speed.)





I wrote a description of why poison and disease and other afflictions of the body can affect undead, in the undead have con thread.

Personally, I think 4e, in its identification of the animus as a real part of a being's core, has given me the perfect tool.

Diseases, and poisons, of all sorts, affect the connection between Animus and physical manifestation.

Whether the agent is chemical, outsider, or 'natural' in origin, in my campaign, they will all affect the animus.


----------

