New ways to pwn people

In the last couple of sessions, I've had the following outcomes for fights:

- The group confronts a thug who'd been tailing them. They want to take him prisoner, but I also can't be bothered with the -4 to attacks for nonlethal damage. So I just run the fight normally, and when the guy gets dropped to <0 hit points, I rule that he's pinned against the wall with someone's sword at his throat. Effectively he has a slab of "hanging" damage over his head, which can be applied at the players' leisure.

- Later, they have a big stand-up fight with a mob lieutenant and her gang. They want to show her who's boss without killing her outright. The archer makes his attack, and drops her to negative hp with one super-strike. Instead of just killing her, he blows her knee out, leaving her a screaming heap on the ground.

In both these cases I run the fight as per the usual combat rules. The difference is in what happens when someone goes to negative hp, when I reckon it's more interesting to allow different outcomes than just dead or unconscious. Among other things, it allows scenes like the duel in CTHD (and similar movies) where Michelle Yeoh ends the fight with her sword at Zhang Ziyi's throat, without having to go through the rigmarole of declaring nonlethal attacks.

Who else uses new and different ways for people to be defeated, besides the standard "he drops to -10 and becomes a grease spot"?

Passes the "really cool!" test, wherein a rule change makes a game more fun for the players. I like!

I think I just found my next house rule. I really like the idea and implementation.

Sounds like a perfect house rule to add to the Pirates of the Phlogiston campaign book. Thanks Hong!

Nice, elegant, effective, fun. Four stars.

Hong pwns death

Hmm...hit points=character's ability to avoid the opponent's desired results.

I like.

I've been doing a lot of adventures in Sharn, where in the upper levels it's not a good idea to leave a trail of dead bodies. So they've been using non-lethal attacks a lot (plus, they need to be able to questions people afterwards). I just dropped the -4 to hit penalty and they just declare they're doing non-lethal damage.

The bard archer has expecially gone this route; he has an almost Green-Arrow-like set of different arrows to do different sorts of non-lethal damage. He wants a tanglefoot arrow to make a 'glue arrow' and 'bolo arrow' to stop running foes

Hmm...I've done as much as the occasional plot-driven fudge...but using it as a house rule never entered my mind.

Its pretty good- and best of all, its SYSTEM NEUTRAL- you could use it in any RPG you want.

2 thumbs up!

Just one question- have you had an opportunity to use this when an NPC redlines a PC?

Dannyalcatraz said:

Hmm...I've done as much as the occasional plot-driven fudge...but using it as a house rule never entered my mind.

Its pretty good- and best of all, its SYSTEM NEUTRAL- you could use it in any RPG you want.

2 thumbs up!

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IIRC the original idea was by Geoff Watson, in the context of how to handle stuff like disarming and sundering. The idea was that if you reduce someone to 0 hp, you can treat them as defeated instead of dead, with defeat in this case meaning "lost your weapon". I just expanded on the concept.

Just one question- have you had an opportunity to use this when an NPC redlines a PC?

Click to expand...

I've run a few sparring duels, where whoever loses is taken to be defeated as opposed to dead. But I have another rule for PC death in general, which is basically that PCs don't die.

Since death is usually just a hindrance in D&D, I rule that if you get killed, you have the option of coming back at the end of the fight at -9 hp. It's like you were "knocked out" instead of dying. However, to keep the sting of death, you take a -2 penalty to everything including AC for a week. As a bonus, this also lets me get rid of widespread resurrection magic, which I've never liked.

The exception is if a TPK occurs, in which case it's all over. If nobody is around to revive you, you don't come back.

It happened to the dwarf last session, in fact, after getting hit for 3 sneak attacks by a twinked swift assassin BBEG.