If there's one thing I hate about 4E it is going unconscious and sitting there only able to roll a Death Saving Throw on my turn.
This system is designed to keep the players who go below 0 in the game, yet keep the suspense and tension related to death saving throws and the possibility of dying. When you drop to 0 HP, you do not go unconscious. Instead, you can continue to fight on, however, at the risk of injury or death.
The wound system using the Keith Baker "wounds as diseases" system that is floating around as I'm a huge fan of that.
I couldn't find an injury system that I liked, so I just developed my own using a lot of the disease conditions.
Thoughts and comments are appreciated.
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Wounds and Death
In the unending exploration of the unknown and the fight against monsters, the heroes risk serious wounds or even death.
Wounded: When your hit points drop to 0 or fewer, you have suffered a serious blow that could potentially lead to injury, or even death. While wounded, you are not considered bloodied. You do not go unconscious when you are wounded. You do not die from reaching your negative bloodied value.
Wound Saving Throw: When you are wounded, you must make a saving throw at the end of your turns each round. The more wound points you accrue throughout a battle, the higher the chance of you risking a serious injury and possibly even death.
Lower than 10: You accrue a Wound Point. Wound Points are marked in your Hit Point box and they do not go away until you take a rest.
10–19: No change.
20 or higher: You do not mark a Wound Point. Instead, immediately spend a healing surge. When you do so, you are considered to have 0 hit points, and then your healing surge restores hit points as normal. You are no longer considered Wounded. If you roll 20 or higher but have no healing surges, your condition doesn’t change.
Note: You or an ally can perform a Heal check to stabilize. If you are stabilized, your hit point total does not change, but you can stop making Wound Saving Throws until you take damage again.
End of Combat: At the end of a combat encounter where you have been Wounded, check your hit point box to see if you have any Wound Points marked. For each X marked as a Wound Point, roll that many d6s. So, for example, if you have 2 Xs in your hit point box, you would roll 2d6. If you have 4 Xs in your hit point box, you would roll 4d6.
Then, compare your result to the chart below:
Less than 10 You have suffered only minor scrapes and cuts. These can be mended easily and you suffer no long-term effects.
10+ You have suffered an injury. (Use the injuries rules below.)
15+ You are dead. Either die immediately (and have a few last words spitting blood from your mouth), or set up a scene with the DM where you die heroically saving a baby from a burning building or something.
Note on Death: Optionally, your DM may choose to allow a Healing skill challenge to save your dying character. If you survive the skill challenge, you must take an injury instead, chosen by the DM.
Injuries
Hit points represent stamina, vigor, luck and skill in combat. When you run out of those (i.e. drop to 0 or below), you enter a state where you risk injury or death in combat. Injuries act very much like diseases and use the rules found on page 49 of the DMG. However, the DCs for moving on the Injury Track differ based on character level, not a level of injury.
SUFFER INJURY
INJURY ENDURANCE DCs
LIST OF INJURIES
This system is designed to keep the players who go below 0 in the game, yet keep the suspense and tension related to death saving throws and the possibility of dying. When you drop to 0 HP, you do not go unconscious. Instead, you can continue to fight on, however, at the risk of injury or death.
The wound system using the Keith Baker "wounds as diseases" system that is floating around as I'm a huge fan of that.
I couldn't find an injury system that I liked, so I just developed my own using a lot of the disease conditions.
Thoughts and comments are appreciated.
----
Wounds and Death
In the unending exploration of the unknown and the fight against monsters, the heroes risk serious wounds or even death.
Wounded: When your hit points drop to 0 or fewer, you have suffered a serious blow that could potentially lead to injury, or even death. While wounded, you are not considered bloodied. You do not go unconscious when you are wounded. You do not die from reaching your negative bloodied value.
Wound Saving Throw: When you are wounded, you must make a saving throw at the end of your turns each round. The more wound points you accrue throughout a battle, the higher the chance of you risking a serious injury and possibly even death.
Lower than 10: You accrue a Wound Point. Wound Points are marked in your Hit Point box and they do not go away until you take a rest.
10–19: No change.
20 or higher: You do not mark a Wound Point. Instead, immediately spend a healing surge. When you do so, you are considered to have 0 hit points, and then your healing surge restores hit points as normal. You are no longer considered Wounded. If you roll 20 or higher but have no healing surges, your condition doesn’t change.
Note: You or an ally can perform a Heal check to stabilize. If you are stabilized, your hit point total does not change, but you can stop making Wound Saving Throws until you take damage again.
End of Combat: At the end of a combat encounter where you have been Wounded, check your hit point box to see if you have any Wound Points marked. For each X marked as a Wound Point, roll that many d6s. So, for example, if you have 2 Xs in your hit point box, you would roll 2d6. If you have 4 Xs in your hit point box, you would roll 4d6.
Then, compare your result to the chart below:
Less than 10 You have suffered only minor scrapes and cuts. These can be mended easily and you suffer no long-term effects.
10+ You have suffered an injury. (Use the injuries rules below.)
15+ You are dead. Either die immediately (and have a few last words spitting blood from your mouth), or set up a scene with the DM where you die heroically saving a baby from a burning building or something.
Note on Death: Optionally, your DM may choose to allow a Healing skill challenge to save your dying character. If you survive the skill challenge, you must take an injury instead, chosen by the DM.
Injuries
Hit points represent stamina, vigor, luck and skill in combat. When you run out of those (i.e. drop to 0 or below), you enter a state where you risk injury or death in combat. Injuries act very much like diseases and use the rules found on page 49 of the DMG. However, the DCs for moving on the Injury Track differ based on character level, not a level of injury.
SUFFER INJURY
- End of Combat: At the end of any combat encounter (or an appropriate situation deemed by your DM), you must roll as many d6s as you have Wound Points. If you roll above 10, but less than 15, you suffer a wound.
- Gain an Injury of the DM's Choice: You immediately gain an injury. The DM selects the type of injury based on the types of attacks you suffered during the fight. Feel free to make suggestions, but the DM has the final call.
INJURY ENDURANCE DCs
- Extended Rest: Generally, you will make an Endurance check after each extended rest to see if your injury stays the same, becomes worse, or gets better. The DC is outlined below and much like treating diseases, an ally can make a Heal check in place of your Endurance check. See the disease rules or Heal skill.
- Improve: 15 + 1/2 character level.
- Maintain: 10 + 1/2 character level.
- Worsen: less than 10 + 1/2 character level.
LIST OF INJURIES
- Shattered - This is a good option when the character has suffered injuries that affect their ability to carry objects or fight, like a mangled arm or smashed hand.
- Recovered - You have completely recovered from your injury.
- Better - The initial effects' penalty to attacks and checks becomes -1.
- Initial Effect - You gain a -2 penalty to all attacks and Strength or Dexterity based checks.
- Worse - You are weakened.
- Final State - One of your limbs stops functioning entirely [maybe it needs to be amputated...]. You cannot use your off-hand for carrying or wielding items.
- Crippled - This is a good option when the character has suffered injuries that inhibit their mobility, like a hurt leg or back.
- Recovered - You have completely recovered from your injury.
- Better - Your speed is reduced by 1 and the penalty to checks becomes -1.
- Initial Effect - Your speed is halved and you take a -2 penalty to all Constitution based checks.
- Worse - You are slowed.
- Final State - You are immobilized [better get a wheelchair] unless you crawl.
- Disfigured - This is a good option when the character has suffered injuries that would also alter their physical appearance and/or damage sensory organs, like a swollen face or burnt skin.
- Recovered - You have completely recovered from your injury.
- Better - You regain one of the healing surges you lost. The penalty to checks becomes -1.
- Initial Effect - You lose two healing surges that cannot be regained. In addition, you take a -2 penalty to all Charisma based checks.
- Worse - The DM chooses one: Your vision begins to blur, or your hearing begins going out. If vision, all creatures beyond 10 squares have concealment from you. If hearing, you take a -10 penalty to Perception checks to hear.
- Final State - You are blinded or deafened (based on your prior state).
- Broken - This is a good option when the character has suffered injuries that would damage their mental state, such as a concussion or trauma.
- Recovered - You have completely recovered from your injury.
- Better - The penalty to checks becomes -1.
- Initial Effect - You take a -2 penalty to all Intelligence based checks and each time you become bloodied, you become dazed (save ends).
- Worse - Each time you become bloodied, you become stunned (save ends).
- Final State - You are catatonic and unable to take any actions.
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