Extended Life Support - good or bad?
During my last weeks rpg session (fantasy, not D&D), our party was seperated into two groups, each one facing a relatively strong opponent. We didn't know about that, however, until it was too late. While the fighters (including me) we charging after the first enemy who had attacked us with a crossbow, the second enemy approached our rearguard from behind. Unfortunately for them, our rearguard consisted only of two magicians and a priest, who are unsuited for close combat. So what happened was, our elementarist (the only one capable of doing D&D-like offensive magic) was temporarily turned into stone by our female mind-control/beguiling mage, saving his life before she turned and ran.
The priest (worshipping a god of thieves and merchants) wasn't so smart. Although he had become invisible, he was hit two or three times, bringing him down to the "permanent and irreversible death" hit point level. The priest even saw the mythological bird supposed to carry his soul to the land of the dead, but the bird told him that his time hadn't come yet, and that the gods needed him to do some things for them before they would take him off this world.
So, after the fighters had taken care of the second bad guy, our two mages and the elf were able to revive the priest, which almost depleted their pool of astral energy.
We are playing an epic campaign composed of 20+ connected adventures. During the course of this campaign the PCs are supposed to receive 7 marks, foretold in the prophecies, making those PCs with a mark practically irreplaceable. However, the priest hadn't received a mark yet, so I didn't consider it absolutely necessary to keep him alive.
I would even have felt slightly angry, if I had been denied death like this.
How do you see this? How would you have felt in such a situation?