Death and Dying + coup de grace revisited

[Vicar In A Tutu]

I was recently reading this thread, and wanted to post the house rule that Destil came up with, just because I'm curious of how people think it might change the game (for better or worse). The house rule is as follows:

A good simple rule that increases the grityness of 4E is that every failed death save costs you a healing surge, instead of a strike. And when you're out of surges and fail a save you die.

Also, a second house rule I wanted to post (that isn't shamelessly stolen from Destil), is a slight change to the coup de grace rule. Many who posted in the aforementioned thread, mentioned that they thought coup de grace didn't pack enough punch. How about this: It would work exactly as per RAW, except that the target would die if he/she/it reached negative hit points equal to the healing surge value (instead of bloodied).

 

[Stalker0]

I think if the rule is "everytime you fail a death save you lose a surge...3 saves and your out" is a good one. Else I will agree with other comments that its actually less gritty in my cases because players have so many surges.

 

[Alex319]

How about this: It would work exactly as per RAW, except that the target would die if he/she/it reached negative hit points equal to the healing surge value (instead of bloodied).

I assume you mean "the target would die if he/she/it took damage equal to the healing surge value from the coup de grace," replacing the normal rule that the coup de grace attack has to do at least the bloodied value in damage. Just replacing the negative hit point thing will probably have a very minor effect, because once an enemy is reduced to negative hit points by any means, he is basically out of the battle.

 

[Vicar In A Tutu]

Just replacing the negative hit point thing will probably have a very minor effect, because once an enemy is reduced to negative hit points by any means, he is basically out of the battle.

Are we playing the same game? Last session, our defender dropped to 0 and got right back into the cleric's next round like 7-8 times (due to concecrated ground and administering healing potions, the defender also had the boundless endurence stance activated, so he regenerated 6 hit points per round, if he was allowed a round above 0 hp).

The change to Coup De Grace isn't necessarily supposed to make combat deadlier, but it's hopefully gonna make it easier for the PCs to sneak up and slit the throat of a sleeping giant.

 

[Starfox]

Coup de Grace as written has the advantage that it can actually be used. Of course, this also means it has little or no effect - damaging someone at less than zero hit points either kills or does next to nothing at all.

If I would add something to it, I would make it steal surges, in order to reduce the tendency to "bounce" at zero hp and then back up.

 

[Alex319]

Are we playing the same game? Last session, our defender dropped to 0 and got right back into the cleric's next round like 7-8 times (due to concecrated ground and administering healing potions, the defender also had the boundless endurence stance activated, so he regenerated 6 hit points per round, if he was allowed a round above 0 hp).

The change to Coup De Grace isn't necessarily supposed to make combat deadlier, but it's hopefully gonna make it easier for the PCs to sneak up and slit the throat of a sleeping giant.

I thought we were talking about PCs CDG'ing monsters, not vice versa. Of course PCs get up from zero all the time - I have experienced that too.

IIRC, when a PC gets a monster to zero by any means, the monster is just dead (or he can be knocked unconscious). So the change would have no effect whatsoever on slitting the throat of a sleeping giant.

 

[jstomel]

Are we playing the same game? Last session, our defender dropped to 0 and got right back into the cleric's next round like 7-8 times (due to concecrated ground and administering healing potions, the defender also had the boundless endurence stance activated, so he regenerated 6 hit points per round, if he was allowed a round above 0 hp).

The change to Coup De Grace isn't necessarily supposed to make combat deadlier, but it's hopefully gonna make it easier for the PCs to sneak up and slit the throat of a sleeping giant.

I always assumed that falling unconscious breaks a stance. Is this not the case?

 

[Saeviomagy]

I always assumed that falling unconscious breaks a stance. Is this not the case?

Nope. Stances last until you cancel them, or their duration elapses.

 

[Destil]

How about this: It would work exactly as per RAW, except that the target would die if he/she/it reached negative hit points equal to the healing surge value (instead of bloodied).

How about a cupe de grace costs surges equal to damage dealt, rounded up, and count as a failed saved? Plays better with the first idea...