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I had an idea with that.
Basically have them come back as N levels lower but with the difference made up with NPC class levels. So their saves, HP and BAB stay in the same ballpark (maybe have adept instead just give CL progression but not spell access). And then have them regain levels / catch up as you go.
That way you're still penalized (by being deprived of class features) for dying but you can still contribute aren't behind the curve in terms of hp and whatnot.
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I let my players rebuild all the time.
Me too. My main restriction is: Don't use it to overly adapt to the current situation. I don't want a ranger who has different favored enemies each session, tailored to the expected encounters...
Surprisingly, in like 40 sessions the players rarely made use of it. The more ambitious ones planned carefully anyway, and the less ambitious trust that they will have fun either way. Often they stick with odd choices, because some unexpected benefits come from them or because they consider it a part of the character.
I like to think that it makes character generation more relaxed. You don't have to come up with a plan for a 'perfect build' anymore, before you even really know the campaign...
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My players rarely do rebuilding, and when we do it usually involves access to psychic reformation, but it only makes sense. If you force a player to stick to a statblock as-is when they're not enjoying it, you're just encouraging "accidental" character death. Little changes, like feat choices can be hand-waved and maintain narrative much better than making a PC die and get replaced by Almost-The-Same Guy.
As for the original topic, well, we've had two recent inquisitor-based chassis builds and man, they're flexible, but just not the master of anything. It's a challenge to make them excellent, which isn't ideal for new players.
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Do they keep dropping a level per death? Because it sounds like a good way for a death spiral. Or, once they die they've 'paid the piper', so once everyone dies once, there is no more level penalty?
The latter. I don't allow characters to drop more than 1 level from repeated death- the worst it can do is slow a player's development after that. I don't want there to be a level difference between any two characters beyond 1 level's difference. Note that I do give replacement characters that have died a slight (10%) XP boost while underleveled. So if they survive at an underleveled state, they will catch up eventually.
I was very aware that this rule could lead to a death spiral so I took precautions against it.
Note that this campaign is a sandbox (albeit a sandbox centered around a megadungeon), so if players are having trouble with an enemy they can always do something else and come back later. It's also a campaign that rewards smart thinking and clever ideas, and outwitting a challenge isn't based on character stats. So 1 level isn't the end of the world. I've made the players aware of how it works from the beginning, too.
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Being banned in PFS isn't really an indicator that it's too powerful. PFS dislikes certain playstyles, particularly Dex based one and defensive styles. Most things are banned for either flavor reasons (see: Vivisectionist) or in the interest of keeping build variety within manageable bounds.Just going to second this. PFS tends to demand simple, straightforward builds that work in the new-group-every-game format of PFS. Basically, anything with iffy flavor, complicate, or likely to cause table variance is likely to get the banhammer. Plus, as mentioned, defensive boosts tend to get targeted because they can mess with encounter design: that's why Crane Style got multiple nerfs.
Defensive builds I think get banned because they can turn a quick encounter in very long encounter. I have party of defensive players right now. They usually run 10-15 rnds of combat slowly chipping away at bad guys who need 18-20 on D20 to hit them.